The Pope's Pinarello Dogma F12 fetches €14,000 at auction

The Pope’s Pinarello Dogma F12, which was recently put up for auction by a private seller on Catawiki, has sold for €14,000 (£12,005/$15,179).

The bike was gifted to Pope Francis by Egan Bernal following his victory at the Giro d’Italia in 2021, along with the pink Castelli jersey that he was awarded after shooting into the overall lead after stage 9 of the race, with the latter selling for €1,853 (£1589/$2,009).

Bernal, who is a practising Catholic, described the meeting at the time as "the most beautiful [experience] I've had in my life", and more important than winning the Giro d'Italia stage.

• Read more: The Pope's Pinarello Dogma F12 is up for auction

A total of 47 bids were placed on the auction in total, but things hotted up on the final day when a French and Italian bidder took turns to up the price, before the former emerged victorious. While the €14,000 winning bid is impressive, it fell some way short of the expert estimated price of €25,000 to €30,000.

© Catawiki

The bike is painted in the colours of the Argentina flag

The auction winner’s prize is Pinarello’s range-topping bike from 2021, the Dogma F12, painted in the colours of the Argentina flag, where Pope Francis is from. It is a bike for the traditionalists with rim brakes, Shimano’s mechanical Ultegra groupset, Vision wheels and Pirelli P Zero tyres, plus a Most Talon handlebar.

If the images on the Catawiki website are anything to go by, it is also in perfect condition, which perhaps isn’t too surprising as we suspect that it hasn’t spent any time out on the road.

The bidding for Bernal’s jersey was even more explosive on the final day with the price rocketing all the way from €410 to the winning total of €1,853, which was submitted by an American bidder.

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