On The Road
by: Bill Oetinger 12/1/2001
Patches...who needs 'em?
Recently I received a refridgerator magnet in the mail. It came from my pal Chuck Bramwell, who coordinates the California Triple Crown program, which honors those who complete three or more double centuries in a year.
For years, those earning their CTC laurels have been awarded a very nice embroidered patch...a little bigger than your typical century patch, which is only fair, considering it commemorates knocking off at least a trifecta of doubles. Now Chuck is propoposing substituting the fridge magnet for the traditional patch as the basic commemorative item for Triple Crown winners. It's a good looking magnet, with the same colorful logo that appears on the patches, along with a calendar of all the California doubles, a nice touch that can't go on the patches.
Chuck cites various reasons for the switch, including cost and quality. And this one: "What do riders do with patches anymore? I have a bag full collecting dust..."
Okay, hold on there Chuck...now you've touched a sensitive nerve with me. I like patches. I too have a lot of them, tucked away in a drawer. Someone might say they're not doing me or anyone else any good, but I would disagree.
This question of what's the point of patches comes up on a regular basis around cycling circles. Folks seem to either love 'em or leave 'em behind. Every year when we're planning our club's Wine Country Century, we look at the cost of producing commemorative patches--they're not cheap--and the bean counters in the group will always say, "Think of all the money we can save if we drop patches! And who needs them anyway?" A couple of years ago, the bean counters carried the day and we stopped handing out patches, over the vehement protests of several of us.
We patch-heads kept on grumbling and grousing for two years, and we passed along every complaint and query from a century participant who wondered why there weren't patches anymore. Well, I am happy to say the tide has turned. Our grousing has paid off. We are bringing back century patches for 2002. We're going to make them a free option: you have to check a box on your entry form if you want one. We're not sure how this will work yet, but we think it's worth a try. And now perhaps we'll find out how many people actually do want patches.
I'm not enough of a cycling historian to be able to tell you when and where the commemorative embroidered patch first appeared at cycling events. Probably a long time ago. Clearly, they function in the same way as military patches that identify a regiment or commemorate a famous campaign. They are emblematic of who you are, where you've been, and what you've done. They are, if you like, a socially acceptable form of bragging.
I simply like the way they look: the texture of the intricate embroidery, the gloss of the silky threads in so many bright colors; the variety of interesting images so cleverly stitched together out of those little threads. Even though most modern patches are sewn on elaborate, high-tech machines, the finished product still looks old-fashioned and quaint, like Irish lace, patchwork quilts, and wool cycling jerseys. And of course, each one carries its own story: the remembered tale of that particular ride...my ride on that particular day.
But Chuck's question remains: "What do riders do with patches anymore?" I'm glad you asked! I'm going to tell you. In no order of importance, here are several suggestions for the use and disposition of bike patches...
1. Throw them in a drawer. Well, heck, you say. That's not much of a suggestion. That sounds a lot like the "gathering dust" solution. But there is merit in this suggestion: for one thing, it's easy. You don't have to do anything clever or crafty with them. You just collect them. But here's the neat part: you get to take them out and play with them. A year or two ago, we had a bunch of our out-of-town cycling friends spending the weekend...in town to do that very same Wine Country Century. On the following morning (Sunday), we were lingering at the breakfast table, sipping coffee, picking over the crumbs of sticky buns, and talking bike talk as only a bunch of old bikies can do. Someone mentioned patches. I got up, went to my drawer, and returned with several dozen patches, which I scattered across the table. What followed was a hour-long walk down memory lane. Each patch was a trigger for at least one anecdote. ("Wait now...was that the year it rained or the year it was 105°?" or, "Oh god, I got four flats on that one!" or, "We did that one in under five hours!") That pleasant morning reminiscing with friends and passing patches around completely justified their value to me.
2. Frame them. One friend of mine, who has done as many organized rides as anyone I know, has taken all of his many patches and has ganged them together into batches of about a dozen or twenty, has laid them out on matt board, and framed them. They hang in his den. Altogether there are several framed patch "pictures" on one wall, and scanning back and forth along this wall triggers the same memories as our breakfast session.
3. Put them under glass. Not behind picture frame glass, but under the glass of a coffee table. My grandparents had a table in their back den with a heavy slab of glass for a top. Pressed flat under the glasss were dozens of family photos. I used to love to pore over that table, grazing back and forth among the snaps shots, so evocative of past summers and Christmases, of favorite uncles and aunts. I suggest a similar table with dozens of colorful patches arrayed under the glass top. I think it would look great. (You'll note that both of these home decorating tips appear in "dens." Admittedly, only a seriously deranged bike junkie would decorate the front parlor with a collection of commemorative patches. But that's what dens and rec rooms are for, where quirky and hokey are okay as decorating imperatives. And anyway, it seems to me a tastefully arranged grouping of colorful embroidered patches is going to look at least as attractive as a wall of bowling trophies or a shelf of whatnots.)
4. Use them as coasters. Speaking of coffee tables...in case yours has a nice wooden finish on the top instead of a slab of glass, you might feel the need to protect it from the sweating beers of your biker scum buddies when they drop by to quaff a few cold ones. In that case, whip out your unique set of drinks coasters: event patches! Impress your friends! Jump start the conversation (see Item #1)! Protect your furniture!
5. Make an album. If you're one of those cyclists who takes a camera along on rides and collects snapshots, then liven up your photo albums with your collected patches. I think all photo albums look more interesting whey there are various keepsakes interspersed among the photos...ticket stubs, stamps, whatever seems appropriate. You could add number bibs to the book too. Come to think of it, you could add these to the other collections of event patches as well: in frames or under glass. Patches could be a little bulky for a conventional photo album, so you might want to think about how to modify the book to allow room for the the thicker embroidery. But if you're at all handy, you ought to be able to make it work.
7. Sew them on your clothes. What a concept! That is, after all, the original function of patches: being sewn on clothes. But it strikes right at the heart of the perceived problem with patches, at least in the minds of some in the anit-patch camp: we don't tend to put embroidered patches on our lycra cycling clothes, so what clothing do we sew them onto? There are several possibilities. I have seen folks at bike events with a vest covered in patches. This is worn around camp, or as a warm-up/cool-down garment before or after rides. It could just as well be an old jacket or denim shirt that serves in that same capacity. I have come up with a varient on this theme that allows me to actually wear patches on a ride. I have sewn two of the California Triple Crown commemorative patches on my Camelbak. (Tip for morons: take the water bladder out before sewing.) I think this looks pretty cool.
8. Use the patches as...patches! Patches are amazingly useful for, of all things, patching holes in clothes. Can you believe it? They're mounted on sturdy backing material and they've already been nicely hemmed around the edges (unlike a scrap of fabric). Plus they look neat, and if the hole you're patching is in the right place, you can sometimes pretend you're not frugally patching a damaged garment, but that you meant to put a patch there, purely for decorative reasons! I know a woman who uses her commemorative patches to patch her toddler's little Osh Koshes when they go out in the knees. Back in my misspent, hippy dippy youth, I prolonged the life of an old pair of Levis with so many embroidered patches that the patched areas eventually came to cover about 60% of the jeans. These were mostly Army Navy surplus patches. (I once had to make a hasty exit from a cowboy bar in Albuquerque--in 1969--when a drunken redneck took exception to seeing the patch of his former battalion sewn on my butt.) I still have those pants stored somewhere. My wife says we're keeping them to donate to the Smithsonian.
In a more relevant vein--relevant to cycling--I have also prolonged the life of a pair of cycling shorts with a patch. When you crash, often the first casualty will be your shorts, with that mean old asphalt grinding a hole through the fabric. Sometimes the shorts are trashed beyond repair, but sometimes the hole is tiny, and if you deal with it promptly, it will stay tiny. In one such case, I was able to cover the hole on my hip with a century patch. Now, you may say this is absurd. That no one with any shred of style sense would wear shorts with a patch on the ass...but listen: these were good shorts! Almost new, still with a lot of life in the chamois! I hated the idea of throwing them out, considering what good shorts cost these days. I do admit that they look a little...odd. I confess these have become my shorts of last resort. I try not to wear them on group rides. They're the ones I pull out for those solitary, weekday training rides, when I don't expect to see anyone I know. But using those salvaged shorts has in turn prolonged the life of all my other, more presentable shorts by the sum total of all the rides in the funky ones. For this useful little economy, I'm willing to look like a minor fashion fred occasionally.
Okay...enough suggestions! If I haven't convinced you of the usefulness and worthiness of patches, then you're just not willing to be convinced. In that case, send me all your old, unloved patches. I'll throw them in my drawer with the other useless, worthless patches. Someday, on another lazy Sunday morning, we'll take them out and wile away the time passing them around and meandering down memory lane again.
Bill can be reached at srccride@sonic.net