Giovanni Maino - 1950

The great racer Constante Girardengo turned pro in 1913 with the Maino-Dunlop team, and Learco Guerra (see image above) won the 1933 Milan-San Remo and the 1934 Giro d’Italia both with Maino.

Guerra was also 1931 World Road Racing Champion and Champion of Italy from 1930-34,
MAINO WAS A TOP END BIKE AND TEAM AT ONE TIME, SEEMS A SHAME NO ONE KNOWS ABOUT THEM,
After WWII. Giotto Cinelli was also good racer, good enough to be on the Maino squad in 1936 and to finish in 10th place in Milan-Sanremo

1919: “I want to do business in iron and steel and make a fair and honest profit” wrote Angelo Luigi Colombo, aged 27, to the lessee of what was shortly to become A.L.Colombo’s small factory, the parent plant of the current Columbus tubing. Angelo Luigi had started work for a metallurgical factory in Milan when he was just 12 years old and, in 1919, after gaining sufficient experience, had decided to establish himself, seeing the cycling sector as fertile ground for the enormous innovative potential and obvious entrepreneurial vocation that inspired him. His first customers were mostly small manufactures obtaining supplies of metal tubes for saddle pillars, bent tubes for frames and handlebars, saddles and fork blades and tubes for pedals. Supplies were also aimed at the first leading cycling factories: Edoardo Bianchi, Umberto Dei, Giovanni Maino and Fratelli Doniselli. Five workers, an annealing furnace, a 10 ton draw bench and a great desire for success: that was the first A.L.Colombo plant in via Stradella, Milan, 1,300 square metres to produce.