Written by: Staff
Posted: Tuesday, 17 June 2008
Tour de Fat, New Belgium Brewing’s traveling celebration of all things bicycle, rolls through 11 cities this season, spreading the good word about the myriad benefits of cycling and celebrating mankind’s greatest invention… the bike.
Over
the last eight years, Tour de Fat has captured the imagination of thousands
with record-setting parades, eye-popping entertainment, death-defying contests
of bicycle skill and precision, and, of course, New Belgium beer. This year,
the festival kicks off in Chicago, where Tour de Fat will make its debut
appearance in the Windy City on June 21. Ten more cities across the west are
slated through October.
Opening
each show with a costumed bike parade, Tour de Fat celebrates the power of the
bike. Born in Ft. Collins, Colorado to increase awareness and participation in
cycling as a sustainable form of transportation, Tour de Fat has grown into a
national rite of passage for cycling advocates and bon vivants alike.
“Tour
de Fat is a time to celebrate self-expression and all things ridiculous, so
alter-egos and costumes are highly recommended and will be rewarded,” said
Chris Winn, Tour de Fat’s coordinator and event evangelist. “In the name
of group participation, we treat this event like a potluck…everyone can
contribute to the event in their own way. That is what Tour de Fat is all
about.”
Tour
de Fat is free to participants, but beer and merchandise proceeds go to local
cycling non-profits. The philanthropic cycling circus helped 26 non-profit
organizations in 2007 and raised more than $245,000.
“If
we get more folks than we can accommodate this year, we may have to do one-in,
one-out, and the costumed and early risers will be granted first entry,”
continued Winn. “So arrive early and dress the part – if everybody’s
weird, no one is, right?”
Tour
de Fat seeks to leave as small an environmental imprint as possible and
composts and recycles waste from each tour stop. The waste diversion rate
goal for this year is 95%. All musical acts will perform on a solar-powered
stage, trucks and transport utilize B100, and all vendors operate off the grid.
Highlights
of Tour De Fat:
>One volunteer in each city will
commit to live car-free for one year as part of the Car-for-Bike Trade Program.
The dedicated individual will sign over their car title and receive a
custom-fitted New Belgium commuter bike in exchange. The selected candidate
will chronicle the trials and triumphs along their car-free journey. The
volunteer is chosen after submitting a video describing their desire to live
car-free. For more information, log onto http://www.followyourfolly.com/pdf/biketrade.pdf.
>As part of the Car-for-Bike Trade
Program, each
Tour de Fat stop will have a funeral for the departed car complete with a Mardi
Gras-esque funeral procession. This funeral will be followed, later in
the day, by a celebration of the arrival of the Car-for-Bike volunteer’s custom
commuter bike.
>At the Team Wonderlounge,
participants can join Team Wonderbike, New Belgium’s bicycling commuter
advocacy program. Team Wonderbikers pledge to commute by bike, not car, as
often as possible. Currently, 11,000 people have pledged not to drive 9 million
miles in the next twelve months.
>Tour de Fat 2008 has a new revival
stage for performers with 100% solar-powered sound and decorations made from
recycled materials. The stage will be transported in solar-powered
trailers and the Tour de Fat crew will travel on B100 biodiesel fuel.
>Festival-goers can try out new
rideable art bikes and, of course, the bicycle parade will meander through each
of the stops.
>This year two people and a guest
each will win a trip to Tour de Fat in Fort Collins, Colorado for the home-town
throw-down (California exempt). For a chance to win, log onto http://www.newbelgium.com/vibe_tourdefat.php.
>This is a pro-bike celebration,
not an anti-car rally…non-cyclists are more than welcome to join the
festivities.
Tour
de Fat 2008 will cycle through each of the following cities:
June
21: Chicago, IL
July
19: San Francisco,
CA
July 26 :
Truckee, CA
Aug. 2:
Seattle, WA
Aug. 16 :
Portland, OR
Aug. 23:
Boise, ID
Sept. 6:
New Belgium Brewing (Ft. Collins, CO)
Sept. 13:
Denver, CO
Sept. 20:
Durango, CO
Oct. 11:
Tempe, AZ
Oct. 18:
Austin, TX
For more
information and to see a video montage of previous Tour de Fat stops, please
visit http://www.followyourfolly.com/folly_tour_de_fat.html.
Gymnastics and basketball may get the most attention, but here’s what to expect from our favorite sports. 
