Out With the Old, In With the New!
- Rob Lee
- Aug 10, 2017
- 3 min read
There are many thinks that change within marshalling, some take a bit of time like updates to a race track, we see race series come and go, but none seem to be more emotional that letting go of old overalls and purchasing new ones.
We grow attached to our overalls as they become very personal to us. We decorate them with different badges and after all, they have come on a journey with us for the past few years. Mine for example were purchased nearly six years ago and after one meeting at Anglesey, it was fair to say they’d been run in quickly.
A post shared by A Life In Orange (@alifeinorange) on May 6, 2017 at 12:48pm PDT
Overalls come in all shapes and sizes and usually two colours, orange or black, depending on where you get your overalls from or the reason behind you getting them, but only your overalls are the best.
I did mention that we put different badges on the overalls. Not as a status symbol, but to show what events we have done and other things we hold close to our heart. My overalls bare the crest of my rugby team, but I’ve seen people with the badge of their old military regiment on them or even Harry Potter crests.
The final rip that put these overalls out of commission.
So when the time comes to get new ones, we are a little bit reluctant, we try everything to prolong the staying power of our overalls. By sewing up holes or replacing broken zips we make them last for longer than they should do, but ultimately they come to an end in on way or another; mine got a tear in between the legs and whilst it was stitched up it got another rip around the repair work so it was time to get new.
The new overalls have two downsides, all those years of getting them to a well worn state with a look of many stories soaked into them is wiped out by the brighter than bright new orange! The other is going through the task of trying to sew on all the badges you want to keep from the old overalls.
You wouldn’t lose me in a snow drift with the new brightness.
As I said earlier, there are a variety of overall styles to pick from; two piece, GPX or standard to name a few. I purchased the Standard overalls being the cheapest, but I realised that they didn’t have a pen holder nor a hoop that can be used to clip a radio/scanner onto it. A rookie mistake on my behalf for not checking the styles. However, using the old trick of make do and mend, I now have a pair of overalls that I can take the hook and pen holder from and attach them to my new overalls.
Getting the important badge on!
The next job for the overalls is for them to gain their own stories like my old overalls did. They have got years of rubbing past tyre walls, getting muddy, maybe even the odd bit of dust and fire extinguisher powder will get into it and when the overalls come to fade over time I can be proud of all the things I’ve achieved, and the stories that my overalls now have.
Right, now where is that sewing needle? I’ve only got two days until my next event.
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