07.15.2010 | 11:11 am
A Note from Fatty: The 2011 Fat Cyclist Gear pre-order is going strong, but ends this Monday. Read here for details, and click here to order from Twin Six.
CANTABRIA (Fat Cyclist Fake News Service) – Reacting to a growing tide of feedback regarding its Team Kit, Team Footon-Servetto today has revealed its 2011 Team kit.
“We are of course extraordinarily pleased with the extraordinary — and frankly, unexpected — success of Team Footon-Servetto in the Tour de France,” said Team General Manager Mauro Gianetti in a post-stage press conference. “And want to assure the public that we are taking their concerns to heart with the 2011 Footon-Servetto kit.”
For contextual purposes, the 2010 Footon-Servetto kit is a distinct caucasian flesh color, with a black footprint on the front, as shown below:
(Riders David Vitoria and Noe Gianetti pose with Mauro Gianetti. Source: CyclingNews)
Unfortunately, the footprint is recognizable as such only when the a cyclist is standing and facing you. Which — considering that most spectators see most riders from the side and back, or possibly a front view of the cyclist is hunched over his bike — is essentially never.
To illustrate, the Footon-Servetto kit usually looks like this:
Or this:
(Source for above 2 images: Footon-Servetto team site)
The effect of this design, according to pretty much everyone, is that in the 2010 kit, the Footon-Servetto riders look like they are essentially nude, with holstein cow markings or tattoos.
The spectator reaction is typified by Steve Blanstrom, an American spectator at this year’s Tour de France, who remarked during an early stage as a Footon-Servetto rider went by, “Martha [Steve's wife], avert your eyes! There’s some weird naked human / cow hybrid thingamajig approaching! It’s horrible! Martha! I said avert your eyes!“
Listening to Concerns
Said Sabino Angoitia, Team Director for Footon-Servetto, “Naturally, when we became aware of people’s discomfort with the current Team Kit design, we went back to the drawing board. And I — along with the rest of the team — am pleased to announce that we have arrived at the new, preliminary design for our 2011 kit (shown below).”
“We felt,” said Gianetti, “that the naked human flesh look, integrated with the seemingly random black spots on the jersey, was too confusing.”
“As you can see now,” injected Angoitia, “That problem has clearly been rectified to our satisfaction. Thanks to our new graphic treatment, there is now no longer any question about the skin color on the front. It is 72% fleshier than before, without the distraction of black splotches.”
“Meanwhile,” continued GM Gianetti, “The back of the jersey now quite clearly shows the distinctive spots of a cow.”
“Naked man from the front, holstein cow from the back,” enthused Angoitia. “Absolutely no way you can be confused by the imagery now.”
“Problem solved,” said Gianetti, and then concluded by saying, “By the way, we’re pronounced ‘foot on,’ not ‘futon.’ Although we welcome inquiries from futon manufacturers interested in cosponsoring a pro team.”
The team then went on to demonstrate the new design for the official team bib shorts, which were immediately awarded the distinction of being the first ever shorts to be rated NC-17.
Comments (34)
04.1.2010 | 7:42 am
I’ve got two big pieces of news to reveal today.
The first is no surprise to anyone who’s been following my blog for a good long time: my blog is five years old today. Which means that — at an average of four posts per week, each an average of two typewritten pages long, I have now written approximately 2080 pages for this blog.
Even when you factor in the fact that only 4% of it is any good, that’s still 83 pages of stuff worth reading.
Which, I guess, is not all that much good stuff to write over the course of four years.
Suddenly, I’m finding myself wishing I hadn’t done that particular bit of math.
Luckily for me, there are some other people who haven’t done that math either, because they probably would have reconsidered and then I wouldn’t be able to reveal my second big piece of news, which I — for contractual reasons that will shortly become clear — am going to simply reprint in its entirety below:
Competitor Group Announces Acquisition of FatCyclist.com
Includes Rights to Back Catalog, Future Content
The Competitor Group (CGI), the leading media and event company in the endurance sports industry, today announced the acquisition of FatCyclist.com, expanding and solidifying its cycling and triathalon coverage into the rapidly emerging and hotly competitive “online sport satire” arena.
Mitch Thrower, New Media Officer for The Competitor Group, said, “We are pleased today to bring Elden “Fatty” Nelson on board to our increasingly rich and diverse publishing properties. With his large repository of existing content and the moderate likelihood that he will continue — occasionally at least — to write something of at least mediocre entertainment value about cycling or triathalons, we figured we’d better scoop him up before Bicycling magazine did.”
Nelson — or “Fatty” as he likes to call himself in order to give a patina of likeability to what would otherwise be a fairly unlikeable person — will primarily retain the duties he has already given himself — e.g., write his blog, with some posts being re-published in the online versions of VeloNews and Triathalete Magazine.
There will be some differences, however.
“First, we will be un-revealing Fatty’s name,” said Thrower. “With the recent revelation of the name of another cycling blogger nobody had previously heard of, we think it would be wise if we can get everyone to forget the name of the author of FatCyclist.com. To that purpose, we have a group of editors currently scrubbing his site of his name and image, replacing them with circumlocutory remarks and photos of Elvis during his fat years.”
“After everyone’s forgotten who Nelson is — in a couple weeks, we estimate — we’ll shock the world by revealing that Fatty is actually Elden Nelson. And thousands of people will be excited to know that someone they’ve never heard of is in fact someone they’ve never heard of.”
“This will be somehow meaningful,” said Thrower.
The scrubbing of Nelson’s identity, however, will not be the only change to the blog.
“We’re adding a new tagline to Nelson’s blog,” asserted Thrower. “Something like, ‘He’s like BikeSnobNYC, but he’s from Utah!’ Or maybe ‘He’s like BikeSnobNYC, but we promise he won’t say anything our advertisers don’t want him to!’ Our agency creatives are still working on it.”
Some content will also be removed from the site.
“There are a few less-than-savory posts that have appeared in FatCyclist.com over the years,” said Thrower. “These, frankly, have no place in a Competitor property, and will be replaced by Patrick O’Grady cartoons.”
“Have you seen those drawings he does of crazy ranting cyclists where their jerseys fit so tight that their bellies show?” continued Thrower. “Those crack me up!”
Nelson’s duties will also be expanded into occasional non-fatcyclist.com publishing events. When, for example, Lennard Zinn takes his once-every-seven-years vacation, Nelson will assume his responsibilities.
“Zinn has done a fantastic job of singlehandedly writing the entirety of VeloNews for the past two years,” said Thrower. “Sadly, he has slept an average of 0.001 hours per night during this period, and is beginning to hallucinate badly. We believe that Nelson, as one of three people in the world capable of turning out an entire magazine’s-worth of content in a month, can take his place.”
“We fully anticipate a serious drop in the quality of our technical content, but we figure that if we only do this once every seven years or so people will forgive us. Plus we’ll extend the useful life of Lennard Zinn by an estimated fourteen years.”
As a member of CGI, FatCyclist.com will have access to its deep editorial resources, and will benefit accordingly. Readers will have access to up-to-the-minute race results for both road cycling and their favorite triathalon events. There will also be many, many pictures of bicycles. And of professional cyclists riding bicycles.
All of these pictures will be taken by Graham Watson, who has not slept once in the last nine years.
Finally, Nelson will have the responsibility of writing all new April Fools posts for VeloNews. “We’re very serious cycling journalists, and it’s not easy for us to be funny,” said Thrower. Just check out our pathetic offerings for today. A bike touring site? ASO bought by Disneyland? Contador having a repetitive stress injury due to doing that fingerbang thing all the time? We’re pretty sure Nelson can do better than that,” said Thrower. “And besides, Bike Snob turned us down.”
When reached for comment, Patrick O’Grady said, “Bluster bluster cantankerous blustery outrage,” predictably.
About The Competitor Group
Competitor Group, Inc. (CGI), headquartered in San Diego, CA, is the leading media and event entertainment company dedicated to the endurance sports industry of running, cycling and triathlons. CGI is comprised of the following brands: Competitor Publishing, Elite Racing, Inside Triathlon, the Rock ‘n’ Roll Marathon Series, Triathlete Magazine, VeloNews and VeloPress. CGI owns and operates 25 national events delivering more than 250,000 professional and amateur participants in 2009. CGI publishes four magazine titles with a combined monthly circulation of approximately 650,000 and plans to launch an endurance community web presence under competitor.com in Q2 2009. Further information about Competitor and its media properties can be found at www.competitor.com.
I can hardly wait to start my new life as a CGI-branded blogger!
PS: Do I even need to say April Fools this year?
Comments (60)
02.22.2010 | 11:40 am
A Note from Fatty: A big thanks to Dug for helping me “research” many of the allegations in this news piece.
PARIS (Fat Cyclist Fake News Service) – Floyd Landis, former Tour-de-France champion and longtime sporter of scruffy facial hair, has recently found himself facing a France-based arrest warrant for hacking into the French anti-doping agency AFLD.
Pierre Bordry, head of the AFLD, asserts that “Landis, under cover of the night, wearing black cycling tights and black long-sleeved cycling jersey, snuck into our lab, where — using the mad computer skills he developed in the Computer Hacking Class he took at the local Mennonite Technical College — he proceeded to download all of our most sensitive data, and uploaded all kinds of malware and trojan horses and tasteless, photoshopped images of Thomas Voeckler.”
“Quite clearly, this was Landis’ work,” continued Bordry. “As evidenced by the way he wrote “Floyd wuz here” and “Metallica ROOLZ” on a whiteboard near the computer where he was working.”
“Also, he left candy wrappers, PBR cans, and cookie crumbs all over the place,” continued the AFLD head. “Landis is — in addition to being a doper, hacker, and ninja-like break-in artist — a total slob.”
And today, additional allegations have come to light, casting a still-darker shadow on the already well-shaded cyclist.
More Seriously Illegal Doping Problems
Bordry asserts that, far from merely doping himself, “Floyd Landis also made other people dope. He was sneaking EPO into Basso’s juice, giving Iban Mayo HGH under the pretense that it was mayonnaise, and secretly sneaking all manner of noxious concoctions into Tyler Hamilton’s herbal remedies.”
“We are confident, in fact, that Floyd Landis is responsible for every single doping incident that has ever happened. And for several which have not happened yet,” continued Bordry, his voice quivering with emotion.
Concluded Bordry, “Floyd Landis is the root cause of all doping in the whole universe and must be stopped at once.”
Still More Allegations
Landis’ offenses are not limited to cycling-related activities, according to French authorities. In addition to doping, Landis is guilty of and / or wanted for questioning in France for the following offenses:
- Being the originator of the term “Freedom Fries”
- Owning several McDonald’s franchises in Paris
- Disliking very thin pancakes
- Knocking down and ridiculing a mime, simply because the mime was wearing a beret
- Being possibly descended from Henry V
- Claiming to not consider Amelie to be the best film ever made
- Wearing excessively gauche attire
- Drinking beer while eating fish, instead of going with a nice white wine
- Causing the French defeat in the Battle of Dien Bien Phu
What This Does NOT Mean
According to Bordry, none of this has anything to do with circumventing the conclusion of Landis’ suspension from ranks of professional cyclists and keeping Landis out of France — and hence, from ever making another attempt at a Tour de France win. “Of course we realize that we are investigating Landis for a crime to which another person has already confessed,” said Bordry. “But we want to be absolutely certain.”
When asked why this warrant has not been distributed outside of French territory, Bordry remarked, “That is an excellent question, and I hereby issue an arrest warrant for you, should you ever enter France.”
Comments (41)
12.9.2009 | 9:45 am
First off, I want to reiterate (as in, copy and paste) my thank-you I wrote last night when we crossed the outrageous goal of raising $100,000 — in less than three days (I started Sunday at noon, we hit $100,000 on Tuesday at 8:10 PM).
A HUGE “thank you” goes out to Johan for putting together an outrageous challenge — one so insane I just couldn’t say no.
An even HUGER “thank you” goes out to Team Fatty — by which I mean anyone who donated — for proving, once again, how incredibly generous people can be.
Also, big thanks to Trek for providing the Madone, to Gary Fisher Bikes for providing the FattyFly, to Nick Howe for providing the cool bonus-prize jerseys, and to Trek Travel for providing the Tour de France trip.
This has been the nuttiest contest I’ve ever done, and all the more awesome because it totally fell from the sky.
And now I get to spend the weekend in Arizona, riding with Team RadioShack. And — even more exciting — I get to give away two incredible bikes and the trip of a lifetime.
Sometimes, it’s good to be Fatty.
I understand that sometime today, Johan Bruyneel is going to post a video “thank you” of his own to Team Fatty. When he does, I’ll either embed (if I can) it here, or link to it.
I have to say, I am really, really looking forward to meeting Johan. In addition his being an accomplished person, he’s clearly got a sense of humor and a big heart. And an enormous cleft in his chin.
On the other hand, I am also a little bit concerned.
You see, this morning when I woke up, there was a very disconcerting email message in my inbox. It was marked with the “triple high priority” designation — three exclamation points — which I had not even known exists.
After reading this email, I am no longer at all certain I should even go to Tucson. I just don’t know.
I hereby submit this email for your consideration.
From: Lance Armstrong ([redacted]@[redacted].[redacted])
Sent: Tuesday, December 15, 2009
To: fatty@fatcyclist.com
SUBJECT: DO NOT COME TO TUCSON. PLEASE. I AM BEGGING YOU.
Dear Fat Cyclist,
As you receive this, I know you are excited to come to Tucson and ride with Team RadioShack. You have earned this right, and if there were any other option at all, I would not contact you with this request.
But I have no other choice.
You may wonder, Fatty, how this message is arriving to you from the future. Well, without giving away too much, it’s not as hard to send email to the past as you might think, and I did it by rigging a Pomegranate Raspberry Michelob Ultra to a USB cable (between you and me, the only thing it is actually good for), uploading the email in question to a memory stick, connecting that stick to one end of the USB cable, and then connecting the other end to the input port of any programmable RadioShack radio-controlled device (a car works best), and then propelling that device backward at maximum speed.
Also, nineteen inches of duct tape is involved. I’ll say no more.
Anyway, I — along with most of the rest of the team — have just returned from the hospital and am composing this message to you in the hopes you will do the honorable thing and, for the love of all that’s good in the world, STAY HOME.
I will explain.
Your weekend at the training camp started off well enough. You were clearly nervous when you met all of us, and you might have made a better (ie, less awkward) first impression if you had not tried to hug each and every single rider.
There was a bit of a scuffle when you got to Levi Leipheimer and Viatcheslav Ekimov, though. I guess neither of them have forgotten or forgiven the post you wrote a couple years ago where you made fun of Ekimov’s Mullet and gave Levi a new hairstyle (shown below, just to remind you).
As you went to give Levi a hug, Levi instead spun you around into a full Nelson, which seemed fitting. Eki then began punching you repeatedly in the stomach. This might have been a more successful plan if Eki had any mass at all in his arms, and if Levi weighed more than 84 pounds.
To Levi’s surprise, you dropped to a crouch, bringing him with you, and then sprung backward, flying nine feet through the air (your quads are impressive, by the way), and landing with your (considerable) full weight and momentum on Levi. Which — naturally — crushed him, leaving few if any bones unbroken.
Levi hopes to walk again about the time the Tour of California starts. Nice work, Fatty.
Dinner hardly went any better. Unaware of your super power, the chef did not lock the door to the kitchen. So, imagine our surprise when we arrived at the dining room and found an empty table. You had evidently arrived first, and had brought an appetite.
All that was left were some brussel sprouts (which remained uneaten, because nobody in the world likes brussel sprouts) and the team chef, who was cowering in the corner of his kitchen, weeping.
Two days later, he remains unable to speak, and screams in his sleep. What kind of monster are you, Fatty?
We should have paid attention, should have seen these events for what they were: harbingers of the horror to follow the next day.
We began the ride, and everyone on the team quickly realized you are a danger to yourself and all those around you. As you swiveled your head around this way and that — trying to get lots of good shots with your helmetcam I suppose — you were simultaneously reaching into your jersey for the next picture. Meanwhile you’d be going on and on about how much you’d like a ham sandwich right about now, and would anyone else like a sandwich, and would we all perhaps be interested in turning around and stopping for just a few minutes at the Quizno’s we just passed?
You, Fatty, are a chatterbox. A gluttonous, non-line-holding, erratic pedaling chatterbox.
But we expected that.
What we did not expect, Fatty, was when — while we were still riding — you pulled out an extra-fat Sharpie pen. I remember rolling my eyes, thinking, “Oh, great, he wants another autograph.” But I was wrong. You didn’t want an autograph, you wanted to make some on-the-fly edits to the new Team RadioShack jersey. “This will only take a sec,” you said, trying your best to modify the RadioShack logo to look like your Clydesdale logo. “And it will be a huge improvement.”
And that’s when all hell broke loose.
Having had enough, I surged forward, intending to drop you fast and hard. To my surprise, your reflexes were surprisingly quick, and you flung an arm out, hoping, I suppose, to grab my jersey or something.
Instead, you tossed your Sharpie, which — through some anti-miracle of physics — landed right between two spokes in my front wheel.
I flew like an angel. Briefly.
I landed in a crumpled heap just ahead of you, putting me in perfect postion for me to cushion your fall as you braked hard, got sideways, and high-sided right onto the top of me. Glad I could be of service, Fatty.
After that, the domino effect went into high gear.
Zubeldia crashed into the tangled mess that was us. Rubiera landed on the quickly-growing pile, and then Popovych endoed onto the top, earning him ten “king of the mountain” points.
Kloden skidded sharply and avoided us, but shot into a ravine. Leipheimer — riding despite being in a full body cast — followed his wheel and landed on Kloden, which did not injure Kloden at all.
From there, the pileup just grew and grew. Eventually, emergency vehicles were called, and — I believe this was a first — the Jaws of Life were employed to extricate us.
I am not certain, but I believe this is the first time an entire cycling team has been sidelined before the team jerseys were even finalized.
So again, Fatty, let me ask you. No, let me beg you. Please, stay home. For your sake. For the team’s sake. For my sake.
Regards,
Lance Armstrong
PS: Chris Horner also crashed at the same time, but it was apparently unrelated to this incident.
Of course, this is all ridiculous. None of this sounds anything at all like me. I’m sure everything will go perfect this weekend.
PS: I was interviewed on Bicycle Radio last night. If you want to listen to it, go to this page and listen to the 12-08-09 edition of “Escape the Peloton.” My interview begins about 43 minutes into the program.
Comments (97)
10.7.2009 | 10:28 am
A Note from Fatty: I have Very Important News today, but first I want to call attention to the fact that my friends at Twin Six are having their Four Day October Sale. 2009 T-shirts are just $16. 2008 T-shirts are $6.00. 2009 jerseys are down to $45, and 2008 Jerseys are just $35. And that’s not all!
Twin Six is also launching nearly all of the T-shirts from their 2010 collection, and putting most of them up at just $20. The others they’re calling PROTO’s, which are just $12. These are 100% perfectly great and brand new fresh-off-the-printer t-shirts. The reason they’re marked down to $12 is because of small changes Twin Six is making to them — graphic placement, slight color revision, etc. Absolutely perfect otherwise.
The sale ends at midnight Central Standard Time on Friday, October 10/9. Take a few minutes to dig around.
ST. LOUIS (Fat Cyclist Fake News Service) – Lance Armstrong, seven-time Tour de France champion, announced today that he is now 90% of the way to the completion point of becoming a huge nerd.
“Yesterday, when I tweeted my new partnership with Michelob Ultra, I crossed a major Huge Nerd milestone: 90%,” said the surprisingly geeky cycling great. “Only 10% more to go, and my transformation will be complete.”
“While some may not immediately grasp the nerdliness of this announcement,” continued Armstrong, “once you get a feel for exactly what the Michelob Ultra line consists of, you’ll totally see exactly how dweeby I can be.”
According to the Michelob Ultra site’s Product Info page, Michelob Ultra (which Michelob always all-caps, but this news release will not, because THAT’S VERY ANNOYING) in addition to a lager and amber, contains three dorky, fruity drinks. They are described on the product site as follows:
- Michelob ULTRA Lime Cactus: A fruit-infused light pilsner with natural lime flavor and a floral essence derived from the cactus.
- Michelob ULTRA Pomegranate Raspberry: A pilsner with a berry aroma, raspberry flavor, and a hint of pomegranate.
- Michelob ULTRA Tuscan Orange Grapefruit: A pilsner with fresh juicy orange notes and a slight pink-grapefruit finish.
“Yes,” said Armstrong, “I really am acting as the product spokesman for beverages with ‘juicy orange notes, floral essences, and hints of pomegranate.”
Armstrong then executed a snorting laugh, hiked his pants up high above his waist — the cuffs now well above his ankles — and pulled out his Blackberry, at which poinnt he Tweeted, “Just did a snorty laugh and hiked my pants high above my waist.”
Trend Toward Nerditude
“With the Ultra announcement, I have increased my nerditude quotient by 30%,” said the increasingly geeky cycling legend. “My first big move in this direction was of course when I began Tweeting pretty much everything I do.“
“That, however, only brought me to 15%. A mere taste of the nerdvana I hope to obtain. My next — and I think most inspired — move toward absolute geektasticness was to secure cycling sponsorship from RadioShack.”
RadioShack, it should be noted, has won the award for “Nerdiest Store in America” every year since 1921, and does a brisk business in DIY robot kits, radio-controlled cars, and strobe lights.
“The RadioShack sponsorship was huge,” continued Armstrong, “bringing me all the way up to 60% on the Alfred E Neuman Nerditude Appearance Scale (AENNAS).
“But,” said the well-known advocate for cancer research, his voice growing serious, “I knew I could be more nerdly still. And that’s why I’ve chosen to back some of the dopiest-sounding drinks I’ve ever heard of in my life.”
“And I’m not done yet,” said the racing icon, his eyes flashing. “Nor will I be, until I am 100% nerdly.”
What’s Next
At this point of the announcement, Armstrong revealed a poster showing the following image:
“As you can see, I am a visionary nerd,” said the visibly-proud Armstrong. “In addition to my recent partnerships with Michelob Ultra and RadioShack — by the way, I’m very pleased to announce the upcoming TRS-80 Model 2010, which will be released in concert with the 2010 Tour de France — I am leveraging my existing partnerships to help increase my goofiness.”
“Oakley, for example,” will soon be releasing the following new glasses:”
“We’re still working out the details,” said Armstrong, “but in addition to the high-quality optics for which Oakley is known, there will be Oakley-branded tape holding the frame together. We are tentatively calling the material this ultra-low-weight, high-strength material this tape is made of ‘Electrotapium.”
“I am also proud to announce that I am working with Nike to create a new line of off-the-bike wear, consisting entirely of wicking polyester pants, designed to wrinkle, ride up high around the crotch, and just barely graze the top of your shoe when you stand still, showing generous flashes of sock when you walk.”
“It is my contention that these two products, when released later this year, will easily boost my goober factor by the 10% I need,” asserted Armstrong.
“This,” concluded the father of four, “will enable me to embarrass my children as thoroughly as any other father in America.”
Nobody Armstrong has ever met was available for comment.
Comments (64)
« Previous Page — « Previous Entries Next Entries » — Next Page »
