Interview with Renzo

1.    With a family so involved in bike racing, why do you think you went into building rather than racing?Why did I chose to become a frame builder? I remember at the age of 8, I told my mother that when I grew up I wanted to build bicycles.  I have always liked mechanics.
However I have always had the idea of building bicycles, because I come from a cycling family-both my father and brother raced bicycles. I was 3 years old when I started to go to cycling races, and I believe this made an early imprint in me, the desire to build my dad and brother a bicycle that would help them win.  I tried racing a bit in my youth, but it was not my strength, however working as the mechanic on a bicycle was where I belonged.  My fascination was not how to win a race, but instead, how to create a bicycle that wins the race.
 
2.    What teams did your Grandfather, father and brother race professionally for?
My father and my brother raced in the category that in their day was called
amateurs and today the same category is called elite. Neither of them advanced to race in the professional category.
They were good but not exceptional.  However back then the first was harder
now to go pro, I think had they raced today, they could have found a sponsor and gone professional.
 
3. How did you first meet Cinelli?
I met Cino Cinelli when I was 21,  at a cycling
team presentation.  The team was named "Corale Impruneta" and it wascoached by my father. It was a small team out of the Province of Florence, and Cinelli was invited to the presentation of this team. Frankly none of us thought he would come.
Instead, Cinelli, was the kind of person who would make himself available to such things, and came gladly.  During the evening, I asked Signore Cinelli if he would have time to introduce me to the methods of frame construction. At this time, I knew already a bit about frame construction, but I hadn't had the opportunity to learn the secrets of bike construction.  Cinelli saw how young I was, and how eager I was to learn, granted me my request, and he invited me to learn from him.  This chance meeting was the key that enabled me to learn what I now consider the best frame building methods existent.
4. Tell us about the first bike you ever made?
The first bike I built all by myself I built at age 22.  I remember it well because it was also the first Formigli bike ever raced. This bike of course was built in steel
also because at that time aluminum was not used to build frames, and
carbon did not even exist as a possibility. The frame was blue with
Formigli in pearl white.  I built the bicycle for a cyclist who raced competitively.  It performed very well in the descents.  In fact with this bicycle he race in the time trial of Futa.  Futa is a small mountain near Florence.  This race was for many years one of the most important
time trials made in Italy, and was also the first race that a bicycle with the name
Formigli was ridden. I even remember the name of the cyclist, Gianclaudio Serraglini, Although he did not win, he came in the top ten.

5. When and why did you decide to start your own bicycle brand? I started having my own brand of bicycle when I was 22, because as aforementioned, it was my dream tobuild a racing bicycle with my name.  As a youngster, I saw the beautiful racing bicycles, with the names ofColnago, Masi, Pinarello, and looking at these bikes, I dreamed that in the future I could too look upon a bicycle I had built with the name Formigli My first frames I only built for cyclists who raced, never to people who just road a bicycle for hobby.  I've always been passionate for bicycle racing I have always envisioned my brand like a Ferrari, a car that was built for racing Today I changed this mentality a bit, because I believe that a Formiglishould be a universal bicycle ridden by everyone who loves cycling.  But true, my heart will remain always in the idea of building bicycles for racing.

6. Can you tell us a little more about your desire to bring old world craftsmanship to modern materials? I believe that the lineage of old worlds craftsman is dyeing craft, and might not exist in another few generations.   Companies like ours that make products by hand for each individual customer in our country, are few and far between, because today's needslead big companies to manufacture their products in East, where costs are much lower Our philosophy of craftsmanship is to keep the art of the original bike builders who created the secrets of making a Italian frame.  Our goal is to produce a frame that maintains the elements of hand built, where we can customize the product accordingto a customer's needs, and provide the best materials available on the market today. We remain faithful to our traditions, and although we us use modern materials, we continue to build every frame by hand.  We understand there is a thought in cycling construction that machines are precise, and stock molds are just as good as tube to tube construction, and that there is no need to build custom frames by hand anymore.  We will always built by hand, custom, one frame at a time, with the commitment to each customer they will give them the best ride  of their life.  
7. Does all the production occur in Italy, from carbon fabric to painting a finished frame?
All of the production of a Formigli from the creation of each individual frame's geometry to the cutting of the tubes, to the finishing of the frame, painting the frame and finishing prep work to make the frame ship ready is completed in Italy. 
 
8. Can you give us the general process of how a frame is made? How a glued carbon tube bike is created? How important accurate mitering is?
The mitering  is an important part of frame construction, because the customer who buys a frame Formigli, is very attentive to a frame's finish. In addition to providing a customer with a
a product of superior quality, we believe, as Italians who love art and beauty, it is also equally important to produce a product that is  aesthetically beautiful. The mitering is a stage in the process that is done by hand, and to do it requires many hours of work. In fact one of the main reasons why the big companies do frames exclusively in monocoque, is also due to the fact that the monocoque, when it exits from the mold does not need mitering because it is already finished.  This has a much lower cost than a frame which after assembly still requires many hours of work to make it cosmetically almost perfect.
I say nearly perfect because any finishing work done by hand will never be perfect as a work done by a machine. 
 
9. How many different fork options do you use to create the perfect trail?
I do not think a fork creates the perfect trail, is the frame that
creates the perfect trail. When we build a frame,  we study what the frame will be used for .  As an example if sprinter orders a frame from us, we make the frame
with the geometry and angles that suit high speeds.  Changing just the fork trail will not make the frame built for sprinting.
Unfortuntaely, this idea came out with the use of stock monocoque frames, standarized mass production. They try to change its
structure by replacing the fork, which is not the entire solution.   We do not face this problem, because we build from the fork first.  This means, we design a fork's trail and size based on the frame and rider and purpose for the frame, and we build this first.  They we create the rest of the frame around the fork. 
There is a saying in Italy that is applicable to the situation of manufactures that don't build each fork custom for each frame.  Because changing the fork on a stock frame won't solve the problem, we say,a donkey will never become a racehorse.
 
10. Many riders don’t know much about bike geometry and would rather let someone else choose their angles. How do you help those customers get it right? How do you turn words like ‘nimble’ or ‘comfortable’ into geometry? When the customer calls us to explain the particular characteristics of the bicycle they are looking to have, for example, comfort, speed, descents, long legs, back problems, we advise the customer not only the fit that would suit them, but what material we believe they should order the frame in. As an example, we would not recommend a bicycle made out of aluminum for a person who has back pain.  As well for this customer we would advise how we can adjust the geometry of the frame for lessening their back pain by lengthening the wheelbase. To prevent the rider from having to bend the spine we lift as much as possible the head tube. Then there are other characteristics that we use in the construction,in this case I made some examples to make a frame
comfortable, but when we make a frame to perform in races, we completely change the geometry, using other parameters,
but to explain in depth all the details it takes to make a custom frame, I we would need to write a book rather than your magazine article.
 
11. How big is your factory?
Using the word factory for my company is wrong, partly because the public
identifies a word factory to mean an environment with vast space and production lines,  whereas I work in a small workshop of about 100 square meters.
 
12. How many bikes do you make a year? Carbon? Steel?
In total we produce on average about 300 frames a year, only in
the last three years as we have opened beyond Italy, do we see greater demand especially for steel frames, so this number is slightly increased.
However we do make about 200 carbon frames and the rest are steel
and aluminum.  Our capacity will be reached at 60 frames a month.
 
13. Many people now believe real carbon know-how is in Asia, why should a rider consider a custom Formigli?
I think it's normal that 90% of people who buy Asian made bicycles
believe that a bicycle frame made with the monocoque system from
Asia, has a carbon better than ours.  I believe that this
is accepted as fact because advertising dollars have been spent to
get the customer accustomed to thinking in this way.
A fairly simple example would be if a Formigli won the 2013 Tour de France, if the
everyone would say
Formigli that uses the best material, -this is advertising!
I am not one to be the preacher, I just say, that the
Customers who already have a Formigli can tell if it's really good
carbon, and they say so,  It is not my style to say that my
product is better than the others.  I hope in the future as Formigli is written about, ridden, and discussed, that people will better understand our brand, and then,  maybe,
people will understand truly what is really a Formigli.
 
14. Your web site talks about perfectly balanced bikes vs purely light bikes. Can you help us understand the difference? 
Today to sell a bike, there are three important things for it to
establish in the market, and considered. The first being, the bicycle must be light,
second that the design is eye catching and beautiful, the third it must have good
advertising. Formigli, only would fulfill point number two above, because the other two are not part of our philosophy-light weight and advertising.
We have worked for 20 years with the racers, and we know with certainty a bicycle that is too light can have big problems, including
steering. Returning to the discourse about the qualities of materials
especially, in relation to carbon, I believe that when a bicycle is
very light it means the carbon being used is too thin.   I will never tire of saying continue that carbon and steel are
among the best material to make racing frames, but to be good, it must be thick.
Building a true racing bike, and to be more specific
I mean those bicycles that are used
by professional riders, need a structure
completely different from what we normally
see on the bike for the normal sale. Unfortunately, today this
difference is very hard to make it clear to the fans of this
sport.