Originally Posted by
dvs cycles
I thought I remembered them offering one in the exo-grid tubing also? I am probably wrong.
Santana built a custom-sized Beyond S&S tandem for Jay Leno to give as a gift to former Pres. Bill & Senator Hillary Clinton; however, Senate rules prohibited acceptance of the 'gift' given it's $14k retail value. As a consolation gift, Leno had Santana built former Pres. Clinton what was at the time the only Santana single bike made with the Isogrid tubing noting that former presidents may accept such gifts. I think this may have been mentioned in this same
2007 posting I linked to above.
I also ran an item in my Bulletin Board back in Nov '02 regarding the original tandem gift:
Nov 02 - $14,000 Tandem Gift For Bill & Hillary Clinton Deemed "Over the Top" -- As reported by various news outlets, apparently the folks at "The Tonight Show" teamed up with the folks at Santana Cycles, Inc. and presented Bill & Hillary Clinton with a top-of-the-line Santana Beyond travel tandem as a get-well gift following his heart bypass surgery. Unfortunately, no one bothered to check into the U.S. Senate's rules regarding limits on the value of gifts that a sitting Senator can accept and, well, the $14,000.00 (no, that's not a misprint) Santana Beyond was over the limit by about $13,950
Probably have to call and confirm just what they've produced for private and public consumption over the years. One of the referenced posts at BF mentions building only 200 of the Stylus frames and only a portion of those made it into the open market. Heck, I was quite surprised to learn of Santana's short-run of open framed / lower-cost Solana tandems just last month.