martedì 7 dicembre 2010

Very funny photoshopped pictures and some random links about Saxo Bank (post including also other random randomness):

To everyone's delight, on this wonderful page lost in the Blogosphere you can see miss Fede's latest post, in which you'll be able to find the usual random links and, surprise surprise, two very funny photos that have been photoshopped by our dear blogmate Mar.
Our blogmate in fact has recently sent me an e-mail that contained two pictures that she had modified in a very funny way. The leitmotiv of the pictures was, attention attention, men and parfumes.
In fact Mar once read on a blog that Jakob Fuglsang would have looked good acting as a model in an 'eau de cologne' commercial (whoever had this idea is a genius!)
Mar thought a bit about this fact, pictured the commercial in her mind and then she made this really good picture, thanks to which Jakob magically entered the world of parfume's models ;)

Still talking about parfumes, who doesn't like the aroma of coffee? As far as I'm concerned, I really love it (and I'm sure I'm not the only one).
If Starbucks created a coffee parfume, not only would I buy it immediately (although I'd never use it to go to parties or to school), but I think I'd also have a good suggestion for the people who'll have to find a model for the new fragrance's commercial. In fact, who could advertise a coffee parfume better than Jens Voigt, one of the most famous coffee-aholic of Cycledom? ;)


RANDOM NEWS:
After having fun with the pictures above (thank you once very much for your nice work Mar!), let's now go on with some random links.
Let's begin with the first interesting link that I've found over the last days: http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/contador-attends-first-saxo-bank-sungard-camp . As you probably already know, Saxo Bank is having a training camp in Fuerteventura right now and Tim De Waele went there to take some pictures of the riders.
The shocking thing is that in some of those pictures you can see naked men coming out of nowhere and watching/being watched by the riders and the team's stuff in a very curious way. For example, there is a picture of a fat, naked man looking at the riders in a very strange way. Run away as long as you can boys!!!
The second shocking thing is that the naked man who appears in said picture looks at the riders in a strange way, as if he was aking himself: 'Hey, why are these guys windsurfing? And why the hell aren't they taking it easy as me?' Such question, made by someone who's walking on a beach in a very 'natural' way, seems a bit weird to me. Actually,that picture also reminded me of a boy that I saw while waiting to leave my town for the 2010 summer holidays. I was in the center of my village, with a bright orange suitcase, waiting for my friend to come and give me a lift, when there came this boy, dressed like a cowboy and riding a horse. Still, he was brave enough to look at me in a very strange way, as if he was asking himself: 'What is this girl doing?'. A question which, asked by a teenager dressed like a cowboy, in Bergamo, riding a horse in the center of the town, actually sounded a bit strange.
Anyway, back to the link. Another thing that pretty shocked me was the shirt that Chris Anker was wearing while Tim De Waele took some of his pictures. If you check mr. De Waele's website, and notice a Saxo Bank rider wearing a bright pink/blue shirt, you'll immediately understand what I mean. However, as they say, just true men can wear pink, therefore I should probably be happy to know that Chris is brave enough to wear it.
The last shocking thing that I noticed about the pictures is that Riis' idea of 'building team spirit' terribly looks like my P.E. teacher's idea of 'let's teach my girls how to work together!'
The main difference is that, at least, when I work together with my classmates (a kind way to say that I sit down and they stand up on my spine, as if that was a very normal thing to do), we don't have anyone taking pictures of us (after all, I don't think I could actually stand people taking pictures of me during my PE lessons- not if I'm sober, at least).

Talking about other shocking things, I'd like to know whether some of you can recognise the rider who appears in the picture below.
I know that that you won't believe me, but I must tell you that the rider in the picture above is Pellizotti.
'Pellizotti? That Pellizotti? Are you serious? It can't be him! Where did his golden curls go?!?', I hear you wondering in despair. Unfortunately I'm as shocked as you and I don't have the answer to your last question.

Changing topic, Kim Andersen has recently said that Brian Nygaard and he actually started to hire Saxo Bank riders for their team in mid-June 2010 (link: http://www.velonation. com/ News/ID/6612/Team-Luxembourg-and-Saxo-Bank-battle-began-in-June.aspx ) and Jakob Fuglsang said that he had already decided to join the new team of the Schleck brothers before of the Tour's beginning.
Still talking about Jakob, in the next days there will be 'best cyclist of the year' awards in different countries and, as far as Denmark is concerned, the riders who'll battle against each other for this prize are: Chris Anker Sorensen, Matti Breschel, Jakob Fuglsang and Alex Rasmussen. Sorry for you, Jakob's lovers, but this time this Fangirl will support Chris Anker in the fight ;) Go go Chris!
On the other hand, the best Luxembourgian sport personality of 2010 will be named on Thursday, but I think we can already say who the winner will be. Anyway don't expect any post about that prize from me, since unfortunately on Thursday I'll be drowning in a sea of sh..., ehm, homeworks.

On to another news, you must know that Silvére Ackermann was a young rider that I really liked. He used to race for Voralberg Corratec, but then he retired this June during the Swiss Championships. The news made me very sad, since I've always liked Silvére's riding style and I thought he could have been a very good rider also in the ProTour category. On http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/ackermann-explains-reasons-of-retirement, Ackermann explains why he got retired. At least, no one can deny that he did so in a very spectacular way, by getting retired as he was in the leading breakaway at the Swiss national championship.
I'm still very sorry about his retirement, but I wish Silvére all of the best for his new career anyway. Good luck for your future boy!

On to a last (and happier) news, on http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/saxo-bank-names-two-danes-in-giro-ditalia-squad it is said that 2 riders are already sure of riding 2011 Giro for Saxo Bank. They are Mads Christensen and Jonas Aaen Jorgenen.
I must admit that I don't know much about Mads, while last year I wrote a post about Jorgensen and so I followed his first season at Saxo Bank pretty carefully. He's a very good and young rider, so I'm really glad to hear this news. If the Schlecks really don't come to Italy next May, I surely won't have many doubts about who to support during the Giro!

PS: I know that I keep on writing about Saxo Bank and that this may annoy some of you, but:
1) finding interesting news about team Luxembourg is almost impossible, since even Wikileaks would have problems discovering something about it
2) I still love the guys on this team.
(Pic 1 and 2 by Mar, pic 3 by Bettini)

15 commenti:

  1. LOL Fede/Mar - what a GREAT name for a men's fragrance! I would definitely buy Candy!! :P Also love the Jens one :D

    I saw some of the photos of the Saxo camp... it all look a little staged to me, does anyone else get the same feeling? And yeah... aren't we a bit old to be building human pyramids??

    Love Pellizotti's new 'do. Though I must admit I didn't know who he was when he had the long blonde curls...

    Word on the street is Matti's already won some awards lately and he's currently getting all the votes for another one (guessing it's 'best cyclist'). Too bad for Jakob, but yay Matti! :)

    RispondiElimina
  2. OMG I just noticed you listed our Candyman blog under your fave blogs!!! <3

    Tumblr has had some 'issues' lately, so that link isn't working very well. :/ This one is working at the moment though: http://thecandymancan.tumblr.com/ :)

    RispondiElimina
  3. Mar did a very good work with those pictures, no doubts about it! Btw she was the one that decided to call the parfume 'Candy' and I think she couldn't have chosen any better name! ;)

    Saxo Bank's 2010 training camp seemed a bit staged also to me. I mean, here you have those guys (some of which aren't that young anymore) dancing, building human pyramids and looking absolutely happy at the same time.
    I can understand the joy for not being in one of the usual Riis-style boot camps, but the activities that they did in Fuerteventura don't actually look that enjoyable and funny to me. I personally hate building human pyramids at school, but it looks like cyclists (and male in general) don't share girls' ideas of what's entertaining and what's not :P

    I was a bit shocked by Pellizotti's new look because I had always found it very easy to recognise him in the peloton thanks to his long, wild and golden curls. Now that the golden curls have come and gone, things will become tougher for me ;) In spite of this, however, I must say that I really do approve his new look too.

    After reading your comment, Fangirl has started to scream things like: "There's no way that Chris Anker is not going to win the '2010 Best Danish cyclist' Award!"
    However Logic thinks that the battle for the title mainly regards Rasmussen and Breschel, since they were the ones who got the most important results in the last season.

    Mar told me about the Candyman blog some time ago and, since there are many Jakob fans around here (and I quite like the boy as well ;), I thought it would be good to include it in my list of 'Favourite Blogs'. I really love it, although I regret not being able to leave comments on tumblr :(
    It's actually very nice to talk to one of the creators of the candyman blog, since it is very hilarious and funny. Keep up the excellent work! ;)
    Btw thank you for giving me that new link to it: I often had problems with the old one and that really annoyed me!

    RispondiElimina
  4. Awww thanks Fede, glad you love it and find it funny :D Yeah that is one of the annoying things about tumblr - you can't leave comments like with blogspot. But if you ever wanted to leave us a message, you can just click on the 'Ask' button and say hi :)

    RispondiElimina
  5. Hello favorite blogmates ;)
    I'm glad you liked my creations. It's a bit easy, what's not to like about Jakob and Jens??
    Fede, you can always write about Saxobank! CA is still there :) He looks good in pink and blue. Much better than with the Saxo-kit + helmet. I wonder how the FootonServetto look, without that ugly unflattering kit. Okay, I'm gonna look for that right now!

    RispondiElimina
  6. The boot camp is good for creating team spirit...of another team :P I tought Bjarne would have stopped doing these camps given the fallout. It was a bit staged, but also less warlike and more "let's just have fun".
    Thanks Fede and Mar for the good laugh, Jens and Jakob are always good.
    Since Leela writes here I'd like to thank her for thecandymancan and for spokesandracquets, they are extremely entertaining :-) Sorry Fede if I exploit your blog, but for me tumblr is a great mystery and I don't know how to use it :P

    Francesca

    RispondiElimina
  7. @ Leela: Be sure I will :D

    @ Mar: you got the point: I write about Saxo Bank because Chris Anker is still there. I can't help it ;)
    I think Chris' fashion sense is pretty unconventional, but I like it anyway. He often dares wearing strange clothes (like the pink and blue shirt) which, at first sight, usually make me go 'WTF was he wearing in this picture?!?' But then, when I take a more careful look, I always like them :)

    Last year it was extremely hard to express judgements about FootonServetto's riders because, every time I looked at them, my attention was always attracted by their ugly kits. Hopefully this year things will be different!

    @ Francesca: the great thing about Saxo Bank's team camp is that they did the same things that I do at school and seemed to find them hilarious. I'm still shocked by this fact. Btw, it seems that the guys had fun together and this is good. They looked much more relaxed than in their usual boot camps.

    Tumblr is a great mistery also for me. Therefore, if you don't know how to use it, do feel free of talking to Leela here (if she agrees about it, of course).

    RispondiElimina
  8. Thanks Francesca! :D

    Fede I think you should of course continue to write about Saxo!! I really want to follow Richie Porte's 2011 especially in that team! :)

    Tumblr is a little confusing to begin with, but it gets easier. And sure, of course if Fede doesn't mind, you can talk to me on here :)

    Sunny and humid in Oz today... shall I send it over to Euro-land?? ;P

    RispondiElimina
  9. Oh, we have a Richie's fan here! The boy is good, no doubts about it ;)

    Thanks for the weather offer Leela ;) I don't know how the weather is in the rest of Europe, but here in Bergamo we're enjoying a wonderful sunny day right now. After all the rain and snow of the last days, we needed it!

    RispondiElimina
  10. Yes yes Rrrrrrichie!!!!!!

    Look like the sun only reached Italy.. Going north, I had snow, rain, hail and a tiny bit of sun.

    RispondiElimina
  11. It seems that all PE teachers think alike. I too remember having to perform those balances in middle school - except that I also had to wear an ugly pastel blue leotard in a very old gym with no heating.

    I too am happy to still read about the Saxo Bankers, especially I was happy to see Jonny Bellis back at the Saxo Camp. And I liked Chris' shirt.

    RispondiElimina
  12. I just read an article about Jonny Bellis last night. OMG that guy, what a fighter!! Go Jonny!!

    Yes it's my patriotic fangirlishness (that is so a word!) coming out in me for Richie ;)

    RispondiElimina
  13. @ Mar: it's unbelievable, but here in Bergamo we had two sunny days in a row! Hopefully the sun will soon reach also the north of Europe. I hate it when it's very cold for too much time.
    Still talking about European weather: on Wednesday there were 25 degrees in Sicily (South of Italy) and people went to the beach as if it was summer. That made me feel really envious!

    @ Danielle: At least when I build human pyramids with my friends I don't have to wear strange kits- just a white t-shirt and black trousers ;)
    It's funny to see that PE teachers all think the same things. Actually, I believe they spend a lot of their free time imagining new ways of making their students suffer and they probably exchange their ideas when they meet. My teacher's latest idea for example is to make us jump on a trampoline, since she probably thinks that we don't deserve playing basketball, softball and volleyball because they are too entertaining activities.

    Jonni Bellis is a hero, I can't wait to see him coming back on the roads and be able to cheer for him!

    @ Leela: Oh, so I'm not the only one who has to deal with her patriotic fangirlishness ;) It doesn't show much at this time of the year, but I can become veeeery patriotic in the Worlds' period. Not to mention how patriotic I am when I talk about riders who live in my area (Capelli, Vanotti and Tiralongo) or about Italian riders who do well in the Tour!

    RispondiElimina
  14. I think our school uniform was designed to be as ugly as possible. For example, when we played sports outside we had to wear a PE skirt and gym knickers (urgh) but if it was really cold we were allowed to wear joggers - but only under the skirt.

    It was great to see Jonny having fun at team camp, but it will be even better to see him back on the roads.

    RispondiElimina
  15. A PE skirt, joggers under it and gym knickers?!? Oh my, not only do PE teachers try to make students suffer in every possible way, they also force them to wear absurd clothes!
    Btw, I think this was one good reason why you should have been incredibly happy on your last day at middle school ;)
    Actually, one of the few good things about Italian schools is that we don't have to wear an uniform - I'd look ugly in a red skirt with a grey sweater!

    I already imagine how happy Jonny will be when he comes back in important races. He fully deserves this comeback and, hopefully, he'll soon be able to get some good results so that he'll definitely forget about this horrible period of his life.

    RispondiElimina