Tour de Terror
(if you think cycling is stupid)
It all starts with the Giro; when I hear that blood-curdling horn coming from the screen, the terror begins. The Tour de Terror. A whole bunch of cycling men in too-tight shorts and shirts who suddenly fall a minute behind when they can't hold it anymore and have to stop for a number two (haha, I found that extremely funny). They immediately call it sabotage, because cyclists apparently don't poop by nature.
I sometimes think I owe my bookworminess to those cycling drug addicts (that’s what they were back then, Lance and his buddies). On Sunday afternoons, brother and father had to watch pedaling television. After two minutes, dad's eyes would close, those wheels have something hypnotic and nothing happens, and there I was. The brother in his element, because he had exclusive rights to the square box. And I turned to Christiane F., The Rotten Life of Floortje Bloem, and other girlfriends. Yes, I tended towards sad literature.
With a new lover Sunday afternoons are butt-clenching exciting, but when Mr. said he wasn't really into Studio Sport, I ran outside with my pom-poms for a yell. Yes, quite sporty, but for the occasion, I made an exception. All of testosterone Netherlands was on the couch in front of the screen, because Feyenoord could really… And I was sitting with him in the sun on a terrace. So I was the one checking the Nu.nl app with a sideways glance, because sport or not, you remain a news junkie. But there is a little thing. That little thing becomes life-size for three weeks a year and is called the Tour de France. If you think: is that only three weeks, it feels like an eternity. I feel the same. He is a fan. Heat-enduring, it-doesn't-matter-what-fun-things-there-are-to-do fan. And so I get annoyed, giga-gantic.
“Thank you cuckoo that I’m going to sit on a warm, fabric couch at twenty-five degrees to see Froome win again”
First of all, that horn. Like a bunch of rampaging Dukes of Hazard, they moo their way through those mountains. Kiek finds the horn more annoying than the football vuvuzela. Amen to that.
Those tight cycling outfits suit no one and with the clip shoes, they also get a silly duck walk. I live by the Vecht and there are quite a few cyclists moving around, but Sunday morning beats everything. Hordes of cyclists, read: men with a small (or large) edge over their pants and a red face, zoom (or groan) past our house. I've been shouting very loudly for a week: ‘Paris is that way’ with matching arm gestures. But I don't think they find that funny. I do.
Mart Smeet(May loves him, I don’t). Thank goodness Dione de Graaff is now there, who gives the men a good grilling on their cycling. But I had to deal with Mart in Tour in Tour out, Giro in and Giro out. With his scarves and pocket squares.
The time trial, a mountain stage, a climb, a minute ahead of the other, he has to ride his teammate up and may not break away from the peloton. Really, how frustrating is that. Four Tours ago, I had to do that with Froome. And just pedal that jerk to bring his teammate to the finish. I just don’t understand that hierarchy. Apparently, his team doesn’t either, because he has three victories ever since. You don’t win the Tour, it’s a victory.
The yellow jersey, the pink jersey, the polka dot jersey. Here the French reveal their uncontrollable fashion sense again. But I have no clue who wears which jersey and why. Honestly; I don’t want to know either. By the way, it’s not even a jersey. It’s a tight shirt made of a shiny, sliding fabric that also breathes, which comes with two women in small dresses with flowers and champagne.
Nineteen more days. Hold on and remember: there are thousands of women with you. By the way, just unite. Thank you cuckoo that I’m going to sit on a warm, fabric couch at twenty-five degrees to see Froome win again. I’m getting on my bike to the terrace.
