Since the Tenneco take over the Marzocchi family still owns the very successful hydraulic pumps division. The two cousins are busy over there with the day–to–day operations.

CORRADO HERIN – 1997 WORLD CUP CHAMPION

With its 100mm travel the forks were able to give me a lot of comfort and more precision in riding. I’ve always been the kind of rider that spends a lot of time in bike and components settings, the suspension took a lot of this time, but it was easy to find a perfect setting in any condition and terrain. During the racing season Marzocchi developed a prototype especially for our team and they started to use a thru axle that consequently improved the rigidity of the fork with big improvement in the riding precision.

The other athletes were equipped with double crown forks since ’96, so we decided to make a collaboration with the Marzocchi tech dept and develop a triple crown fork. The result was amazing and the first product was the Mr T with 100mm travel and the Super T with 145mm travel. I used the Super T for the first time in Nevegal for round 1 of the 97 World Cup. I had my first of three victories there, they ended up helping me get the World Cup Champion title. It’s clear that the tech improvement Marzocchi made to the shocks had a crucial role in that victory.

The Monster T idea was coming from a motorbike trials project and was probably too big in sections and crown width. For me it was too heavy and rigid and the arm stress was too much. After the Monster T they released the Shiver, an awesome fork that was lighter than the Monster T, with an improved travel length, but like every upside down fork it had the problem of not being rigid enough with less precision in riding and less reactivity.

The Super T was definitely the best but the travel was not enough. Today I really think the 888 is a great fork, with a great balance of weight, rigidity, handling and travel. Also it is very important that, as well as all the Marzocchi products line, the maintenance needs and the settings adjustment are reduced and this thing is very important for most of the riders that do not have the support of a suspension engineer and technical team.

Do you think you were on the best suspension at the time?

In the nineties the support was excellent. The collaboration with Marzocchi’s ‘Reparto Corse’ (racing department) was really unbelievable with a lot of great professionals who loved what they were doing, so the general feeling was really positive and definitely helped me in every victory. I don’t think that today there is the same passion and support that I experienced.

I’m taking care of the promotion and development of the Pila bike park. I’m also organizing here in Pila some event about DH and FR, at this moment I’m organizing an iXS European cup round (August 13^th/14^th) on the same track where as the 2005 World Cup took place. Also I am taking care of the Pila Black Arrows – MTB Herin School team with about 50 athletes and our top athlete Lorenzo Suding who is two times Italian champion and was 20th overall in World Cup. In the remaining time I’m a MTB teacher and I organize freeride and downhill camps.