Lance Armstrong's 1995 Team Motorola/Caloi authenticated by Eddie Merckx

I have finally had Lance Armstrongs 1995 

Caloi team bike authenticated by the Eddie Merckx 

factory, which is great news.

What was even better news was that the man who

built this bike bike was still working at the factory, 

and even remembered building the bike!

Then to make it even better it turns out the the frame builder

is none other the most prestigious of Merckx frame builder the

 famous Johan Vranckx who was sent by Merckx in 1979 to work

alongside Ugo De Rosa in his factory in Italy and learn the

fine art of race cycle frame building.
Here is a great article and interview with Vranckx.

Here is a short clip showing Johan Vranckx building

the Eddy70 limited edition (70 only) steel bike in 2015.

This is the email exchange betwen myself and the Merckx

factory earlier this year...

Hello, I have a 1995 Ex Team Motorola/Caloi Eddie Merckx bike, 

frame No F 9016, made of Columbus SLX New. 

It was sold to me as one of Lance Armstrong's team bikes 

from that year, I am reasonably sure that this information 
is correct, however would appreciate it if you might be 
able to authenticate for sure if this is correct or not. 

There is more information and photos of the bike 

on my site The Flying Wheel here...

  https://theflyingwheel.blogspot.com/2018/03/lance-armstrong-1995-merckx-team-bike.html 

Thanks in advance for your time. Best Adrian

Hey Adrian,

It is true, I can verify that this was Lance's bike once.

Almost impossible to find, 

the maker of this bike is still working for us and he told me.

Have a great day!

Yours sincerely

Lauwers William

I then emailed back asking if I might be able to

use the builder name on my blog...

Dear Adrian,

Of course you may use the name of the frame builder.

It is Johan Vranckx.

 Met vriendelijke groeten / With kind regards,

William Lauwers

So that is the good news, unfortunately the bad news

is that I crashed my bike pretty badly about five weeks

ago, and will take at least another 6-8 weeks before I can

get back to work, so I now am forced to sell the bike.

Oh well, at least I had the pleasure of owning it, even

if it was only briefly. 
(And I did ride it..just once...beautiful) 

For sale here.