Augmented Journalism

Sylvie van der Vaart in Bavaria's Dutch Dress

Dutch brewer Bavaria immediately quit its latest campaign, after running into big trouble with the South African authorities. The campaign featured an orange dress that women were supposed to wear to support the Dutch soccer team.

During the first Dutch World Cup match against Denmark, Bavaria arranged for a group of pretty orange girls to cheer for the Dutch team in the Johannesburg soccer stadium. The international soccer federation FIFA – heavily sponsored by Budweiser – wasn’t pleased though. It convinced the local authorities to arrest 36 Dutch Dress-girls, two of whom will be brought to court next Tuesday.

Bavaria got what it wanted, especially after the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs officially complained about the arrests to the South African government. Of course Bavaria CEO Peer Swinkels has appologized to the girls, but at the same time he will be thrilled by all the attention his brand is getting out of this cheap little Dutch dress. His World Cup merchandise not only turned out to be the best in the field. What’s more important is that with it he has beaten all his other Dutch competitors in the fierce World Cup battle for the beer drinker. Moreover, the campaign has gotten so much attention abroad, (from Indonesia to Kansas City, from Sydney to Milan, even in Germany and everywhere else) that the world is right at Swinkels’s feet.

Football is war, as an old Dutch saying goes. But marketing is one big ambush, we know now. And the Bavaria Babes – in the cheapest campaign ever – have beaten the world.

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The final touches for my book on cycling (in Dutch, in stores May 6th), have been the main reason for my absense on T/S the last couple of weeks. I hope I can make up by translating part of this book for you. It’s full of tips and tricks on buying, repairing and riding bikes and contains loads of anecdotes from my own experience. Furthermore, it helps you decide what clothes to wear, what food to eat and how to improve yourself as a cyclist.

The title of the book is just “Cycling”, although it might as well have been “No Excuse For Not Cycling”, as I spread 30-something well known excuses throughout the book. I’ve tried to debunk every one of them. A selection of them might be a good starter for national bicycle month.

1. Bad Weather
There is no such thing as bad weather for a cyclist. When it’s raining, the raindrops will get you wet; when the sun shines, your own sweat will do the trick. Either way, after a nice shower all your problems will be washed away. If it is too cold, just wear some extra clothing (don’t forget your overshoes). And if it is too hot, be sure to take a lot of water with you. After they finished their ride, complaining about the circumstances is a rare phenomenon among cyclists. Instead they will brag about the cold, the heat, the rain, the everything – in the mean time re-enjoying every meter of the ride they just finished.
2. I’ll make a longer trip tomorrow
Typical excuse from the excuse-specialist. Today is the day! Get up on your bike and take that ride. You’ll be happy at the end of it and you know what, you can still make that longer trip tomorrow.
3. I don’t know what to do with a flat tire
First of all: flat tires are an exception. I ride about 15,000 kilometers a year and have about three or four flat tires. Furthermore, if you always take a new tube with you, the changing is a piece of cake: it’s done in only 5 to 10 minutes. Other complications are very rare too, but be sure to take your mobile phone, so you can get assistance if things get really out of hand. Just like you would do while driving your car.
4. Cycling is tiring
It may look like it, but it isn’t the case. In fact, cycling gives you energy. The cyclist wins strength every day. Not only physically, also mentally. The harder the  effort, the sharper the mind. Your boss will be happy too: the more you ride, the better your performance at work.
5. The wind is always against me
Cycling is a lot like life: sometimes circumstances are in favor, sometimes they are against you. But never all the time. Especially if you ride a circle, your own direction will change more often than the wind will ever do. Mathematically spoken, there is as much wind in your face as there is in your back. But most of the time it is somewhere in between. If it is not blocked by something like a building or a forest. Not to speak of all the occasions that there is no wind at all. The person that keeps saying he always has the wind against him, will just have to start counting. On his bike, that is.
6. I don’t have my car for nothing
Hey, that’s true, you didn’t buy your car to leave it in the garage. Just like they didn’t invent trains, plains and space shuttles without reason. That’s precisely why bikes are around. They don’t compete with cars, because they have another purpose.
7. I don’t have the cash for a good bike
If you visit an average bicycle store, you can easily get the impression that you need an awful lot of money for some good biking. And that real achievements are only possible after donating a couple of thousand dollars for a bicycle and another one thousand for clothing and shoes. Not to speak about the computers that will show you the way through your neighbourhood. Nonsense. Most second hand bikes – the ones that can be found in the attic at your mother-in-law’s – will do. And if you don’t find one there, try Craigslist. Either way, you don’t have to spend much. Only be very sure the bike is still safe to ride on. And if, after a couple of months, your cycling ambition is still growing, there is enough time to visit the store where your dreambike is on sale. You will have had the advantage of having saved some more money.
8. First I have to go on a diet
Another one from the professional excuse-finder. If you feel you have gained too much weight, there is no better reason to take the bike. You’re losing time every day, so hop on your bike very quickly. You can always go on a diet afterwards. Be careful though to go cycling with too little nutrition. An athlete needs good food to be able to perform. Your body needs it. It is burned away in the action, so there’s no need to be afraid that you gain weight again.
9. I’m a woman
Cycling is as fun for women as it is for men. Moreover, men and women can do it very well together. For a young couple in love, there is no better way to spend their vacation than cycling through southern states.
10. It’s bad for my sperm production
A former world cycling champion once said that the only time his private parts felt badly, was outside of the cycling season. “Just ask my wife”, he was quoted by the interviewer. Moreover: cycling is historically strong in catholic parts of the world. And in China. Do I need to say more?

Front Page De Telegraaf: "Fatal Change of Lanes"

Just a couple of days after the world has noticed that the Dutch want to back off from Afghanistan, the country’s self esteem has received two more blows. They seem to hit the Dutch even more.

First, the certain gold medal winner Sven Kramer (speed skating) made the unforgivable mistake to choose the wrong lane, and got himself disqualified. At the crucial moment he was in a winning position,  a little over half way in his 10,000 meter race. His coach, Gerard Kemkers, took all the blame – he had a moment of uncertainty and gave his skater the wrong signals. The Dutch were so shocked that it even made “Sven Kramer” a worldwide trending topic on twitter.

But maybe even worse, a couple of hours later the bob sleigh team led by Edwin Van Calker decided not to compete at all. Van Calker had a feeling that “he wasn’t able to control the bob”. After four years of training, spending incredible amounts of money in the best bob sleigh the world could build, he just backed off. Leaving the rest of his team – and country – in frustration.

This morning, there is only one thing people in the Netherlands can talk about: where did we go wrong?

“Hell, no! I’m not going to do that.”

Dutch gold medal winner Sven Kramer (5000 meters speed skating) is quick to respond a reporter from NBC after being asked what he just did. “She is crazy”, he added a couple of moments later on Dutch television. “She was there when it happened.”

The NBC-reporter wanted to know “if you can say your name and your country and what you just won here.” About the same kind of question a Dutch reporter could have asked the New Orleans quarterback right after winning the Super Bowl.

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The Netherlands. Imagine a tiny country by the sea with 16 million people and around 40,000 square kilometers in size. Of which about a quarter is water. Once a famous nation that ruled the world (I admit, that was 400 years ago), now a modest constitutional monarchy of which most Americans think that its only export products are beer and marihuana and its capital is called Medellin. Or Munich, depending on the neighbourhood you’re living in. Unless of course your name is Bill O’Reilly – he apparantly has a huge poster of the Amsterdam Red Light District above his bed.

But as everybody knows, every country needs to have this one special thing it takes great pride in. Well, in the Netherlands it’s football. Or soccer, as Americans have started calling it. Hey, we’re good at it. In fact, we’re the best in the world. Of course there’s Brazil and sometimes Argentina or Italy or England, and yes, we have never been world champions, but we do play the most beautiful game of soccer that has ever been played. The Dutch soccer school is famous all over the world, Dutchmen are hired as coaches on all continents and our players are leading the most famous European soccer teams to their victories. Which, indeed, means that within the Netherlands foreign players are hired to fill up our league’s top teams. You win some, you lose some.

Anyway, in soccer we’re on top of the world. Despite the official third place our nation occupies on the FIFA-ranking, every Dutchman knows that our men outperform any other country. Our men, indeed. We’re all quite certain that soccer is a men’s game. Performed by men, watched by men drinking a certain amount of beer and being served by girls and wives that bring us bitterballen and vlammetjes to keep us comfortable. A matter of tradition, some things just can’t be changed.

This was until recently. Although hardly anyone knew that the Netherlands had some sort of a female soccer league, we all found ourselves cheering when our national female team suddenly reached the semifinals in last summer’s European Championships. Out of the blue, that was. The players gained national fame in a matter of weeks, the trainer (also a woman) was praised because of her sharp coaching and the team itself became a hype.

Source: KNVB

And it is not over yet. Today this recent national soccer pride has reached a new high, with the contract that Daphne Koster signed with American champion Sky Blue FC. Koster is the captain of the succesful national team and the first Dutch girl ever to cross the ocean in order to play soccer for a living.

So it’s about time for a serious statement. Here we go. On the part of a united Europe, but especially the Netherlands, we hereby, officially, take back all our poorly justified criticism on your lack of understanding for the beautiful game of soccer. We’re the best and you seem to have noticed. So there must be some good sense in you.

Daphne will join you in march. Please be good to her.

The Tour de France is about to begin, so nobody is surprised to read the word “doping” in the sports pages of every newspaper. Will it be a clean tour? (of course it won’t be) Will there be new doping ‘victims’? (of course there will be) Will Lance Armstrong finally be caught? (probably not – although that won’t be enough to win the race).

But in the midst of all those predictable doping related stories about cycling and the Tour de France it was a huge surprise to most, that right now, in the heart of summer, the long time German speed skating champion Claudia Pechstein (37) was associated with blood doping. Her coach, the American Peter Mueller, was quick to state that Pechstein also had two other coaches during last season. Her lawyers have immediately asked for a counter-expertise. But Germany already lost its faith in a different result. In fact, the Germans are totally fed up with athletes using doping.

The country lost its doping-innocence a couple of years ago, when cycling champion and former Tour de France winner Jan Ullrich admitted to have taken doping on a large scale. It left the sports loving part of the country in shock. Not having a tradition in cycling like for example the Belgians, French or the Italians, the German love for bicycle racing had been growing fast in the 1990’s. The nation found heroes in Erik Zabel, Stefan Schumacher, and of course Jan Ullrich. It attracted a lot of sponsorships and tv-attention.

But it didn’t last.

Where in the traditional cycling nations the fans seem to understand that the athletes are only human and may be attracted to illegal performance-enhancing drugs (they even feel pity instead of anger for them), the German reaction was quite opposite. Sponsors stepped out, the Tour of Germany was cancelled, tv-stations stopped theire live race reports and pulled back most of their reporting force.

Only a couple of years ago the Germans would, on a day like this, be discussing the chances of their heroes in the Tour de France. Just like most other western European people – and maybe some Lance Armstrong or Levi Leipheimer fans in the United States as well – still do these days. Today, there will only be a sigh of recognition because of the news about Claudia Pechstein.

“Unsere Sonnenschein” (our sunshine), as Pechstein is always called, is Germany’s most successful Olympic Wintergames athlete, with as much as 5 golden medals. She was world champion in allround speedskating and always had a lot of respect from her competitors, not only because of her talent but also because of her open en happy character.

It is to be feared that all of this, including her magnificent track record, will not be enough for her to keep the sympathy of the German people.