Motorcycle Book Reviews. Page 3.
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Page 2 & Nick Adams Travelog
The Complete Book of Moto Guzzi: 100th Anniversary Edition.
Publisher: Quarto Publishing Group. ISBN: 978-0-7603-6770-4.
The Complete Book of Moto Guzzi: 100th Anniversary Edition by Ian Falloon was first published on the 3rd November 2020.
Chapters
Early Days: The 1920’s
Technical And Racing Success: The 1930’s
The Golden Era: 1945-1957
Difficult Times: 1958-1966
The Early Seimm Era: 1967-1972
Expansion Under De Tomaso: 1973-1987
The New Generation: 1988-2000
The Eagle Flies Again – A New Life Under Aprilia And Piaggio: 2001-2021
On the 15th March 1921, one of the world’s foremost motorcycle brands was founded in Genoa as Società Anonima Moto Guzzi by Carlo Guzzi, Giorgio Parodi and Angelo Parodi. In 2021 that company, Moto Guzzi will mark its 100th Anniversary. Moto Guzzi is the oldest European motorcycle manufacturer in continuous production.
To mark the 100th Anniversary, author Ian Falloon has produced this beautiful 272-page hardcover book. Illustrated with 350 historic period black and white images and colour images of models from the very first, the 1921 Normale, to the 2020 V7 III Stone S and V85TT, the book details every model produced by Moto Guzzi.
The book also details Moto Guzzi’s history of achievement in competition. By the time it ended its factory Grand Prix racing program after the 1957 season, it had competed in 3,329 races, won 14 World Championships, 6 Constructor’s Championships, 47 Italian Championships, and 11 Isle of Man TT victories.
Ian Falloon recalls the company’s technological achievements, including the 500cc liquid cooled, DOHC V8 that debuted in 1955. Despite having won only 3 GP events in three seasons of racing with reliability problems causing frequent DNFs, the V8 was way ahead of its time.
Any company with a 100-year history will have experienced plenty of ups and downs. The book covers the financial fluctuations, as well as multiple changes of ownership on the way to today’s Moto Guzzi.
We can recommend The Complete Book of Moto Guzzi: 100th Anniversary Edition to all Moto Guzzi enthusiasts.
As of January 2021, it is widely available new with prices ranging from £29 to £45.
Moto Guzzi Factory Racers.
Publisher: FBA Moto Italiane. ISBN: 978-88-86774-16-1.
Chapters
Foreword
Moto Guzzi Singles
Moto Guzzi Bicilindrica
Moto Guzzi 500 V8
Published to mark the Moto Guzzi 100th Anniversary in March 2021, Moto Guzzi Factory Racers by Alan Cathcart includes not only the complete technical evolution and racing history of the 500cc V8, but also all the bikes which preceded it. That includes the factory’s world title-winning 250cc and 350cc singles, as well its various 500cc contenders.
The book covers the history of the Moto Guzzi factory Grand Prix racers up to 1957, when the company withdrew from racing at the end of that season, having won the 350cc World Championship for the fifth successive year.
It also includes Cathcart’s personal riding impressions of two of the most significant models in Guzzi’s history, the 500cc wide-angle 120-degree V-twin Bicilindrica, and the V8 Otto Cilindri which succeeded it.
Moto Guzzi Racers is a large format (30cm x 23cm) hardcover, printed on quality paper, with 160 pages and 91 photographs. It’s the treatment of those photos that makes the book especially attractive. Franco Bartoli, the owner of FBA which also publishes Bicilindrica, a quarterly magazine dedicated to Moto Guzzi, has printed almost every one of them full-page, so the images can really be appreciated to the full.
The book is published in English and Italian by FBA Moto Italiane in Firenze, Italy, and costs 49 Euro. To order the book, see: https://www.motoitaliane.it/en/prodotto/moto-guzzi-factory-racers
