Road Bike Racing - Where do the jesery's / shorts / Skinsuits come from?

Looking at the front of the '08 Cannondale catalog, there is a guy sporting the pink leaders(?) skinsuit for the Giro (I think). My question is, since it has all of the logo's and whatnot on it for the Liquigas team where do these outfits come from? Does every team member have a full set of possible jersey combinations supplied by the team (ie polka dot, white)? Do the race organizers make up a full set for every contingency for every team? I'm sure there is a simple answer but my interest was piqued.

Good question. I would imagine they just fire off a set with a computer and sublimation printer on the spot. Perhaps someone knows?

CDR, you've seen behind the curtain, what do those wizards do?

Good question. I would imagine they just fire off a set with a computer and sublimation printer on the spot. Perhaps someone knows?

CDR, you've seen behind the curtain, what do those wizards do?

heh why me?

On the podium they have iron ons for each team for the chest.

Then it's up to the team to make up their cool outfits. Since it's pretty important to have nice stuff, the team will have that stuff made overnight (or later that night).

Since I haven't seen behind the curtain of a large stage race, I don't know. However, I read that some teams brought stacks of yellow helmets and frames and such to the Tour. I don't know if they used any of them.

Anyone with "real" experience?

cdr

Rich Hincapie was screening the Georgia jerseys on site immediately after the race and before the awards ceremony. He wasn't doing it in Missouri; he was lounging in VIP.
Otherwise, each team travels with adhesive/iron-on fabric to adhere to them in the green room.
I have one from Phonak that I got during the '06 Amgen Tour. And i have an old Motorola one somewhere in my collection that I got at the '95 DuPont. I stuck that to a replica Worlds jersey.

I never thought of just carrying the decals, I guess that would be the cheapest way. Thanks!

CyclingNews had a quick article about Giant specially painting a TCR Advanced SL frameset yellow in Germany and having it hand delivered to France and built so Kim Kirchen could ride it his first day in yellow.
I guess Uvex also pre-supplied a few yellow helmets for the team in case.

But this is a well set-up team who was expecting some spotlight. However when Feillu (sp?) held yellow, he looked like a [relative] slob.
In the end, it's just a case of "are we expecting time in [jersey], and if so, are we willing to invest maybe $500-700 in special gear for it?"
Bringing this to a new level, though, was in the '08 Giro when Bettini had his race number custom subliminated to his jersey.

Last year, there was a thing on VS about this. For at least the TdF Ceremony Jersey's there is some guy that has been doing this for a while (according to the clip) and has a bunch of blank yellow/green/white/pokadot jerseys in different sizes. They have a computer with the main logos (for example the Old disco jerseys would have just the Disco logo and not AMD or something like that) in the system and would print/make the jersey as soon as the winner of that jersey was finalized. He said each team provide a list of the jersey sizes of all their riders so that way if a guy like Ulrich (sp?) doesn't get an XS.

Not sure about the complete winner color sponsor jersey/kit. Seems to me if you had them made up pre race, it would be uber bad mojo.

Last year, there was a thing on VS about this. For at least the TdF Ceremony Jersey's there is some guy that has been doing this for a while (according to the clip) and has a bunch of blank yellow/green/white/pokadot jerseys in different sizes. They have a computer with the main logos (for example the Old disco jerseys would have just the Disco logo and not AMD or something like that) in the system and would print/make the jersey as soon as the winner of that jersey was finalized. He said each team provide a list of the jersey sizes of all their riders so that way if a guy like Ulrich (sp?) doesn't get an XS.

Not sure about the complete winner color sponsor jersey/kit. Seems to me if you had them made up pre race, it would be uber bad mojo.

Exactly.

That's why you only see the Yellow, Polka dot and Green bibshorts, gloves, socks and helmets on the last day.

Last year, there was a thing on VS about this. For at least the TdF Ceremony Jersey's there is some guy that has been doing this for a while (according to the clip) and has a bunch of blank yellow/green/white/pokadot jerseys in different sizes. They have a computer with the main logos (for example the Old disco jerseys would have just the Disco logo and not AMD or something like that) in the system and would print/make the jersey as soon as the winner of that jersey was finalized. He said each team provide a list of the jersey sizes of all their riders so that way if a guy like Ulrich (sp?) doesn't get an XS.

Not sure about the complete winner color sponsor jersey/kit. Seems to me if you had them made up pre race, it would be uber bad mojo.

For even a one day race with a jersey, the promoters will make a size run of jerseys. For example, one year at Philly (90s) they changed jersey sponsors at the last moment. The original sponsor actually made a size run of the US Pro jersey, but another sponsor stepped in. I don't know the story of the sponsorship change, only that suddenly there were three jerseys that weren't any good - S, M, L - with original sizing, original graphics, etc. Usually the promoter gets one (i.e. the guy that actually runs the event, since the "promoter" is really a big company), the winner gets one (i.e. the size they want, on the podium), and a major sponsor gets the last one. Because the jerseys were never used for the race, this meant that none of the standard folks got one. This resulted in the jerseys, unwanted at some level, to be given away to some folks not associated with the race :)

I think nowadays there are a LOT of leader's jerseys etc printed. These are to be signed and given to various sponsors etc. However they are usually not team specific, kind of like the Yellow Jerseys they show the daily leader signing after they take the yellow jersey. Has the jersey sponsor and that's it.

As far as genuine, i.e. not iron on, stuff like gloves, helmet, etc, they can be quickly made in a factory and next-day shipped to the team hotel. Or, if you have staff flying in, you bring it on the plane. Or, if it's really important to the company, you get some lucky soul tickets that night to fly to France (or wherever) that night so that they show up before the stage start the next day. Or, if you want to tempt fate, you make them up before you go to the race.

If anyone has seen "Cobbles, Baby!" the Paris Roubaix promoters show the plaques they've had made up for the shower stalls (the winner gets a plaque mounted in a stall). They have 10 or so plaques with the various favorites made up, including George Hincapie (who, obviously, has not won a P-R at this point). So sometimes the promoter will be a bit proactive in setting something up. I doubt that, for example, they made up a bunch of plaques for Alpe D'Huez though.

cdr

As far as helmets go... Each team brings along a couple different designs etc. In the DVD "A road to Paris" the Giro rep. is shown dropping off the freshly painted Atmos' for the tour. Lance also use to bring 3 yellow jerseys at the START of the tour so he would have some on hand for when he took yellow.

I too saw the screen printing article on VS. For key favorites "ex. Robbie Mcewen etc. teams prolly have bibs and jerseys already made up for the green jersey polka-dot jersey.

Thanks for the answers guys... I've been educated.

Last year, there was a thing on VS about this. For at least the TdF Ceremony Jersey's there is some guy that has been doing this for a while (according to the clip) and has a bunch of blank yellow/green/white/pokadot jerseys in different sizes. They have a computer with the main logos (for example the Old disco jerseys would have just the Disco logo and not AMD or something like that) in the system and would print/make the jersey as soon as the winner of that jersey was finalized. He said each team provide a list of the jersey sizes of all their riders so that way if a guy like Ulrich (sp?) doesn't get an XS.

Not sure about the complete winner color sponsor jersey/kit. Seems to me if you had them made up pre race, it would be uber bad mojo.

Saw the same piece. Guy was well organized and could cover just about anything.