The Jersey Project
The coolest thing at cycling s annual trade show is going to be a book called The Jersey Project.    The premise of this $28, coffee-table-worthy photo book is simple: Pictures of jerseys. The pay-off is boundless. The thick, four-color pages show from one to 12 jerseys each, some of them captioned with the name of the rider who wore the specific jersey photographed, some merely identified by team and nationality. Throughout, there are larger write-ups on significant riders. Some of the spotlights fall on stars you d justifiably expect, such as Fausto Coppi or Raymond Poulidor, but some of the most satisfying finds are things like the full-page write-up on Herman Vanspringel s 1968 Mann-Grundig jersey, or Gerben Karsten s 1965 Televizier jersey and the stories behind them.   Leafing through, for hours, I was delighted by surprises such as Greg LeMond s La Vie Claire combine jersey from the Tour de France, which incorporated fields of polka dot, green and yellow into the iconic Mondrian-inspired design, making one of the all-time greatest team jerseys even more amazing. Until prompted by the photo, I d forgotten that the Tour used to award the combine (determined by tallying the results in all three disciplines).   From the Ruffles (potato chip) Tour of Texas, to the evocatively named teams Locomotief (1950s) and Gazelle (1980s), to the puzzling rainbow-goose-egg logo of Dutch Zero Boys and more, I keep finding new favorites. Disco-pop colors and Euro-trash aesthetic reign supreme on some pages, while others are nearly solemn and museum-like.   The book is an American adaptation of a Dutch collection, titled Koerstrui, that former American pro Bill Humphreys was shown by a friend in 2010. Inspired, Humphreys not only bought the North American rights to the book, but also began soliciting entries from his old racing friends and contacts. The result is a new, 52-page section focusing on American history that precedes the original content. The U.S. section is divided into short chapters with titles such as Club Jerseys, Regional Club Sponsorships, and Wool Shorts, Iron Will, that also serve as a short history of domestic cycling since the 60s. There s John Allis s Princeton jersey, Steve Woznick s Paris-Sport (which sent me into my basement closets in a futile search for the one I, apparently once, used to own), Mark Whitehead s AMF, the Centurion-Shimano from Bunki Bankaitus.   There s nothing else quite like this book. Its purity of purpose to concentrate on showing jerseys would not have been achievable if the idea had been seized by a --Bill Strictland/Bicycling MagazineThe book is a time capsule which goes through the history of the cycling jersey. I can t recall another book that tells so much of the story of cycling. The collection is not necessarily representative of significant moments in cycling nor is there much of an order to the various chapters, but it s a pleasure to flip through which has brought me back to the computer to find out more. There s always more to learn about this sport and a book like this makes me realize how little I know. --Cycling Tips/AustraliaThe Jersey Project Wed, 11/30/2011 - 12:18pm by schmalz There are some products out there that, when I come across them, they make me think, "Goodness, this was conceived especially for me." "The Jersey Project" by Bill Humphreys and Jerry Dunn is a book that has me convinced that the authors were sitting in a room developing their tome whilst staring at a photo of my goofy gnomish face tacked to the wall. Surprisingly, both men survived.   As background information, I should mention that I make my living as graphic designer and have done so for the past twenty years. This means I have acquired a lot of books with pictures of things in them, mostly pictures of posters and advertisements, but also books filled with photos of products: cars, consumer items and gnomes and such. So when I found "The Jersey Project" available for sale on the Gage+DeSoto web site, I leapt at the chance to purchase it. Here it was, a designer-y book of pictures with pictures of cycling jerseys, something I confess to being completely obsessed with. I admit to being excited about getting my copy (which I didn't even use my "credentials" as a "journalist" to weasel a free copy from G+D), and when it arrived, I plowed through it with the enthusiasm of a pack of nursing home grannies tearing through a pile of crossword books after mistakenly being given methamphetamine in their paper medicine cups.  And The Jersey Project is a meth grannie's dream, 198 pages of jersey after jersey, with some pages covered in rows of twelve and others with just one significant jersey and an accompanying description. The 1970 Molteni Giro leader's jersey is the image that serves as the image for a description of Merckx's career. Peter Van Petegem gets a smaller entry that sits aside an image of his 1994 Trident-Schick jersey, a team very few probably know about, and a team that fewer still associate with PVP. But that's the quirky fun of The Jersey Project, the jerseys are categorized according to rider, with the book split up into sections according to races and regions. The section for the USA was added to the original Dutch version of the book ("Koerrstrui") by Bill "Bike Guy Humphreys, and is split into sections according to clubs, races and even "Greg Lemond". This makes for a frustrating experience for those looking to quickly find team jerseys (the index is according to rider), but it makes for a glorious experience for someone taking their time to discover the quirky and eccentric history of cycling jersey sponsorship. It's the completeness of the book that makes it so enjoyable, the collection has jerseys from the days of sewn wool and front pockets to the dye-sublimated, retina-ripping designs of the 80s, plus all of the modern teams and leader's jerseys. If you want to see the evolution of the Belgian Lotto team sponsorship in the 90s (and who wouldn't?), you can pick through the photos and see their design ethic evolve. If you want to see when Bricobi left the Mapei team, you can do that in a few pages time also. You can watch American cycling progress from small regional clubs to teams with juggernaut corporate sponsorship. There's a million ways to approach and consume this book, and that's what serves to satisfy the Meth Nana in me. --NY Velocity