Hawkwood wrote:Merckx 1972 - Eddy Merckx (actually a Colnago), 9.6 kg
Interesting! Merckx's 1974 "Merckx", shown in Heine, is clearly De Rosa (with the cloverleaf etched in the bottom bracket) and is listed @ 11.0 kg. The geometry was all Merckx, though. I believe Heine, the editor of Bicycling Quarterly (which I may well subscribe to after reading this book) used modern weighings of all of the bikes, not relying on contemporary claims, as there are also a consistent listing of frame geometry including pedal stance, something not normally easily determined from photos, for example.
That '74 Merckx is a very nice looking bike. It's hard to find any significant improvement in LeMond's Gitane from 7 years later. John Marino's "Huffy" from 1982 (Mike Melton) had Suntour's slant parallelogram rear derailleur, Shimano Dura-Ace AX components, shaped tubes, and Shimano's "aero" pedal design which was a lot slicker than the old quill design.
Dan