I am a longtime admirer of Rivendell bicycles, and Grant Petersen's design philosophy. Petersen describes his flagship and best-selling model, The Atlantis, thusly: "The Rivendell Atlantis is what we've always called an All-Rounder. An Atlantis is as happy on the road as it is on fire trails, unloaded or heavily loaded."
I was very happy to have found this spring in a nearby bike shop (for the princely sum of $37.50, no less) a 1987 Bridgestone T 700: an Atlantis prototype from the time Petersen was employed by Bridgestone. The accompanying text in the 1987 catalog is unmistakably in Petersen's voice: "This is the most versatile road bike we make. It's got the low gears of a touring bike, so you can climb any hill, but its racey geometry gives it a road feel that no loaded-touring style bike can match. If you're tired of hating life in the hills and you don't want to give up response in the flat lands, this is the one." Sure sounds like an "All-Rounder" to me.
In a Rivendell Reader article entitled "The Atlantis before our Atlantis/A rare, limited production Frenchy-type bike from Bridgestone," Petersen describes the inspiration for the T 700 by way of a first generation Bridgestone touring bicycle: "This is the first bike I saw named Atlantis. It was designed by Bridgestone (Japan) employee Hiroo Watanabe back in 1981 or 1982. He's still at Bstone, and as far as I know, he still likes French bikes."
Five or six years after Mr. Watanabe's production bike tribute to French constructeur Alex Singer, Grant Petersen must have played a significant role in the creation of the Bridgestone T 700 "Touring Series," father to the Rivendell Atlantis a generation later.
My bike is fairly stock, with the addition of a Petersen-approved tall Technomic stem, wide Nitto bars, and for fun, a Bottecchia-style front fender extension.
I was very happy to have found this spring in a nearby bike shop (for the princely sum of $37.50, no less) a 1987 Bridgestone T 700: an Atlantis prototype from the time Petersen was employed by Bridgestone. The accompanying text in the 1987 catalog is unmistakably in Petersen's voice: "This is the most versatile road bike we make. It's got the low gears of a touring bike, so you can climb any hill, but its racey geometry gives it a road feel that no loaded-touring style bike can match. If you're tired of hating life in the hills and you don't want to give up response in the flat lands, this is the one." Sure sounds like an "All-Rounder" to me.
In a Rivendell Reader article entitled "The Atlantis before our Atlantis/A rare, limited production Frenchy-type bike from Bridgestone," Petersen describes the inspiration for the T 700 by way of a first generation Bridgestone touring bicycle: "This is the first bike I saw named Atlantis. It was designed by Bridgestone (Japan) employee Hiroo Watanabe back in 1981 or 1982. He's still at Bstone, and as far as I know, he still likes French bikes."
Five or six years after Mr. Watanabe's production bike tribute to French constructeur Alex Singer, Grant Petersen must have played a significant role in the creation of the Bridgestone T 700 "Touring Series," father to the Rivendell Atlantis a generation later.
My bike is fairly stock, with the addition of a Petersen-approved tall Technomic stem, wide Nitto bars, and for fun, a Bottecchia-style front fender extension.
1987 Bridgestone T 700 Atlantis Prototype ©Daniel Dahlquist