A few weeks ago I was in a French stage race. I was getting changed in our van with the door half closed. I just got a wash cloth over my body and put on my underwear as fast as humanly possible when I felt two eyes staring at me. I looked up and straight into the face of a man who had taken his time to observe what exactly was going on in the van. His arm folded, he stared straight into the van. When our eyes met, he didn’t show any signs of being caught in the act. No, he folded his arms firmer and kept staring.
That pissed me off. I pulled the door of the van completely open, exposing my body from top to toe. “Can you see it? Yeah, take a close look. Nothing weird to see here, all perfectly normal!!,” I yelled while gesturing at my underwear-clad body, Even though I spoke Dutch and the guy French, I made it very clear. He can’t have missed the point, so to say. Bizarrely enough, the man got angry. I don’t know what he said and why he got angry but he made wild gestures at me before he finally diverted his gaze and walked on.
To prevent situations like this happening again, I took a skirt to the stage race I am doing in the Ardèche at the moment. I saw other women in the peloton do it. If you pull a skirt over your bib shorts, you can easily peel these off without showing the world your naked bum. It is the best solution for French men who haven’t got the tiniest bit of decency.
So poor souls in the Vuelta, if you find yourself in a situation again this week where you finish at a place where the team buses can’t come, be prepared. Take a skirt.
"— Marijn Fietst» Blog Archive » An intimate secret from the women’s peloton
