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I joined Loon State Cyclists before the 2006 season knowing little about the club other than that a few people I knew were members.  The thing about LSC that was so surprising was that every time I went to a team event or talked to someone on the team they acted like they had known me for years.  I met Kevin “Skibby” Schaeffer at the first Opus race in the registration line. I handed him my entry form and he looked at it and saw that I was a Loon.  He reached out and shook my hand and introduced himself as Skibby.  I said my name was Andy Frye and he stared me in the eye, still holding my hand firmly, and said, “Frye huh, we’ll have a nickname for you before the end of the season.”  Later I toed the line for the Cat 5 race and about three laps into it I was off the back wondering why I decided to race again after a 14 year layoff.  I came around the bend and saw Skibby in the corner clapping and he yelled something like, “Come on Frye, get up there.”  Looking to escape the pain, my mind wandered to our earlier conversation and I began to worry about the nicknames that were running through Skibby’s head at that moment. 

 

Well, luckily Skibby never christened me with a nickname that season.  My performances certainly wouldn’t have inspired any nicknames that would be too endearing.

 

 

Nicknames have long gone hand in hand with sports and friendships but something about the sport of cycling beckons us to come up with nicknames for one another.  Some people just have names that lead to easy nicknames while some get their nicknames because of something they’ve done, their personality, mannerisms, or physical appearance.  Most I’ve found are purely situational and didn’t involve a whole lot of thought or foresight.  Nicknames can provide a sense of inclusion and intimacy which may lead some to yearn for a nickname in an effort to belong.  They struggle in their quest to have a nickname bestowed and efforts include painstaking periods of trial and error.  The path to a great nickname is instantly doomed by the words, “Hey, we need to come up with a nickname for you.”  Sure there are legends in nickname creation history but most are mere mortals.  The true great nicknames are spontaneous in their creation.

 

Good nicknames offer a richer moniker than given names and create mental caricatures of the individual.  Sports is rich with great ones from the past like The Splendid Splinter, The Iron Horse, The Refrigerator, The Round Mound of Rebound, Magic, and The Assassin.  Pro Cycling is loaded with great ones too like The Cricket, The Badger, Big Mig, The Pirate, The Lion King, and of course The Cannibal. 

 

Much like pro cycling, the amateur scene is ripe with nicknames.  The best of the local scene include Donimator, Skibby, Red Lantern, Super Rookie, Hanz and Franz, and Hollywood.  These days blogland is a major source of nicknames.  Bloggers label their sites with their nickname or a name that describes themselves yet provides a certain level of anonymity.  Knowingly or unknowingly they brand themselves with nicknames that stand the test of time.  Blognames include StevenCX, Red Lantern, and T3. 

 

Turns out the stories behind how nicknames are derived are quite bland and not as entertaining as I thought.  Gee … how did Timmer, Jimmer, Zim, Doiger, and Dano get their names? There are a few stories that do stand out though.

 

-  Kevin Schaeffer got his nickname “Skibby” from the current LSC president Mike Delaney after hearing Bob Roll’s stories about Danish rider Jesper Skibby’s antics in the peleton.  Skibby has a few screws loose too and now has an annual LSC “Bonehead” Award named after him. 

 

-  Jay Hendersen’s knack for finding the spotlight which culminated in several media appearances in the same day prompted Eric Marcheski the start calling him “Hollywood”. 

 

-  Ray Wrobleski aka “The Track Whip” and “Lunatic Biker” was calling riders to the start for a race at the NSC Velodrome in Blaine and yelled at Hanz (Taylor Olson) and Franz (Ted Schmid) to get to the rail.  Something to do with their size?

 

-  BTDC’s own Tim “Super Rookie” Hayes got his name shortly after starting as a bike messenger.  The newbies were referred to as rookies during a nebulous probationary period.  Tim took being a rookie to a whole new level as was soon deemed “super” for some unknown reason.  Super Rookie stuck and the rest is history.

 

As for myself, two nicknames have become clear leaders – “A-Train” and “Hitman”.  Early last season several of my Masters 4/5 teammates and I were joking around and decided that we needed to give each other nicknames.  A-Train came about because of some lead-outs I gave a few of my teammates in some early season races.  Hitman is harder to nail down.  Bryan “The Cobra” Loecken laid it on me and I’m guessing it was because, to put it mildly, I’m a tad competitive and tend to pick out guys to “target” in races.  In doing a little research for this story I found one from the 60s and 70s that seems more fitting.  Raymond Poulidor got the nickname “Eternal Second” because he finished second or third eight times in the Tour de France and was second at the World Championships four times.

 

In part two we’ll provide a listing of nicknames from the current genre of local cycling.  Let us know if you really think people don’t know who you are and don’t want us to out you.  In the meantime, if you’ve got an interesting story about your nickname or someone else’s, tell us about it in the comments section.