Categories: Awesome German GuysBreaking The RulesEtiquetteLook Pro

The All-Red Onesie

Even Kittel can't make this work.

When it comes to personal style and charisma, Marcel Kittel is at the top of the food chain. Only a certain kind of genius admits on live television that the most stressful thing about racing a Grand Tour is having your hair gel confiscated by airport security. He also clearly has a mystical, Samsonesque power to his hair; off comes his helmet and his hair is as perfect as it was during the pre-race interview. The only other person I know who can wear a helmet all day and still have dreamy hair is Kylo Ren, but he obviously uses the power of the Dark Side to cultivate that talent. I don’t know what Marcel’s trick is.

Marcel is also blessed with the sort of devilish good looks that would make you hate him a little bit if he didn’t seem so damn mischievously fun to be around. Besides his perfect blond hair, the rotten little charmer has eyes the color of glacial pools and the sort of smile that makes women’s knees buckle involuntarily; everywhere he goes, women bob around like gas station windsock dancers.

He even makes the Etixx-QuickStep team kit look good, which is quite the accomplishment given that the only thing uglier than the Etixx-QuickStep team kit is the Astana team kit. Ain’t nobody can make that turquoise strip look good so long as Mario Cipollini doesn’t come out of retirement just to give it the old college try.

No matter how good you are at looking good, some things simply can’t be done because some things – like, say, wearing an all-red spandex onesie, makes you look like you are smuggling satsumas from the Netherlands into Italy.

So kids, listen to Keeper Frank: say no to drugs and don’t try to pull off the all-red onesie; leave that to the professionals. Actually, no. Don’t leave it to the professionals, either. Let’s not leave it to anyone. Please stop. Everyone. No more onesies in any color other than black. Please. For the children.

frank

The founder of Velominati and curator of The Rules, Frank was born in the Dutch colonies of Minnesota. His boundless physical talents are carefully canceled out by his equally boundless enthusiasm for drinking. Coffee, beer, wine, if it’s in a container, he will enjoy it, a lot of it. He currently lives in Seattle. He loves riding in the rain and scheduling visits with the Man with the Hammer just to be reminded of the privilege it is to feel completely depleted. He holds down a technology job the description of which no-one really understands and his interests outside of Cycling and drinking are Cycling and drinking. As devoted aesthete, the only thing more important to him than riding a bike well is looking good doing it. Frank is co-author along with the other Keepers of the Cog of the popular book, The Rules, The Way of the Cycling Disciple and also writes a monthly column for the magazine, Cyclist. He is also currently working on the first follow-up to The Rules, tentatively entitled The Hardmen. Email him directly at rouleur@velominati.com.

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View Comments

Teocalli says:

May 10 2016 at 9:33 am

@KogaLover

@Teocalli

@Buck Rogers

I should have added – Especially when you only have it by default.

Pardon my french, the guy in red looks like Sagan but he’s not with Sky? So must be Elia Viviani since Kittel is already wearing pink and Tjallingii already wearing blue. Reminds me that who wears the maglia nera actually really earned it.

Kinda my point that if you are hosting it as the actual holder is further up the hierarchy too, then one should perhaps be a bit discrete.
Al__S says:

May 10 2016 at 11:01 am

No onsie today- but still pink-trimmed bibshorts which shows the team came prepared. Which is why it's a joy when someone unexpected gets a jersey, as it means maybe bar tape as maximum (mechanic sent to raid the local bike shop) and none of this nonsense. You can bet Astana have pink frame hidden in the truck.
ccos says:

May 10 2016 at 2:52 pm

Wearing a skinsuit is also a not so subtle way of telling your teammates "I ain't carrying shit today" owing to the lack of pockets.
Al__S says:

May 10 2016 at 11:40 pm

Um, the road racing skinsuits, from the Castelli Sanremo onwards, are furnished with three pockets in the normal position.

They are though a statement of intent. I can't believe EQS didn't have a pink onsie for Kittel, so wearing bobs and jersey was an obvious "I'm not likely to be sprinting" broadcast to the peloton.

That, or "I'm so much faster than the lot of you I don't need to aero kit". If you look he's also not in the aero version of the helmet
Teocalli says:

May 11 2016 at 12:54 am

@Al__S

"They are though a statement of intent."

Hmm - what statement of intent was Viviani making then?
LeoTea says:

May 11 2016 at 4:31 am

Was thinking about this last night - what options do the riders actually have here? For leader's jerseys, it's not the teams that provide them, it's the race organisers. And there's probably 2 options - a straight jersey, or a skinsuit. And given that the organisers would have to organise a skinsuit for potentially any one of 198 cyclists, they can save themselves some work by not having team specific "shorts" on the skinsuits.

So, if a rider in a jersey wants a skinsuit, they have to go with the single colour. There is of course the sensible solution of the half-and-half (red/pink on top, back on the bottom), but it wouldn't surprise me if that's against some daft UCI reg or other.
Ron says:

May 11 2016 at 8:26 am

Awaiting delivery of a cycling kit themed onesie for the nearly two week old little dude. My riding buddy told me he bought him one!
frank says:

May 11 2016 at 9:33 am

@Gianni

He is looking pretty badass in pink.

Seriously, how does his hair do that.
1860 says:

May 11 2016 at 9:37 am

Kittel might be reading this site, since today he wore a more decent red jersey and black shorts. Unfortunately he got chewed up and spit out the back of the peloton, so if he is superstitious he might go back to the onesie...
frank says:

May 11 2016 at 9:37 am

@LeoTea

Was thinking about this last night – what options do the riders actually have here? For leader’s jerseys, it’s not the teams that provide them, it’s the race organisers. And there’s probably 2 options – a straight jersey, or a skinsuit. And given that the organisers would have to organise a skinsuit for potentially any one of 198 cyclists, they can save themselves some work by not having team specific “shorts” on the skinsuits.

So, if a rider in a jersey wants a skinsuit, they have to go with the single colour. There is of course the sensible solution of the half-and-half (red/pink on top, back on the bottom), but it wouldn’t surprise me if that’s against some daft UCI reg or other.

The UCI regulation is that they need to wear team-issue shorts or matching shorts. But it gets violated all the time (just look at Dumoulin's kit).

I wonder if that skin suit is issued by the race, however, the cut looks an awful lot like the Vermarc version, but who knows.

In any case, I agree he doesn't have much choice apart from not wearing a skinsuit but that doesn't make it look any better. I'd forgo the 1% drag benefit and race in a jersey like a civilized person anyway.