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New Belgium’s Tour de Fat Celebrates Pedal Power

in Chicago June 21
Volunteers can Apply for Tour de Fat’s Car-for-Bike Trade Program, an Opportunity to Trade in Four Wheels for Two

Ft. Collins, CO, June xx, 2008 –Tour de Fat, New Belgium Brewing’s traveling celebration of all things bicycle, is cycling into the Windy City for the very first time this year. The festival kicks off its season in Chicago on June 21, spreading the good word about the myriad benefits of cycling and celebrating mankind’s greatest invention…the bike. Over the last eight years, Tour de Fat has captured the imagination of thousands with record-setting parades, eye-popping entertainment, death-defying contests of bicycle skill and precision, and, of course, New Belgium beer. Ten more cities across the west are slated through October.
Opening each show with a costumed bike parade, Tour de Fat celebrates the power of the bike. Born in Ft. Collins, Colorado to increase awareness and participation in cycling as a sustainable form of transportation, Tour de Fat has grown into a national rite of passage for cycling advocates and bon vivants alike.
“Get ready Chicago, Tour de Fat is all things ridiculous,” said Chris Winn, Tour de Fat’s coordinator and event evangelist. “You’ll find costumes everywhere, art bikes you wouldn’t think you can ride (but can) and great entertainment.”
Tour de Fat is free to participants, but beer and merchandise proceeds from the Chicago stop will go to West Town Bikes, which offers bicycle mechanics workshops, youth programs and special biking events to Chicagoans. New Belgium’s philanthropic cycling circus helped 26 non-profit organizations in 2007 and raised more than $245,000.

“We are all about cycling, recycling and adding some folly to the day. So grab your bike, put on a costume and come join us,” continued Winn.
Tour de Fat seeks to leave as small an environmental imprint as possible and composts and recycles waste from each tour stop. The waste diversion rate goal for this year is 95%. All musical acts will perform on a solar-powered stage, trucks and transport utilize B100, and all vendors operate off the grid.
Highlights of Tour De Fat:

One volunteer in each city will commit to live car-free for one year as part of the Car-for-Bike Trade Program. The dedicated individual will sign over their car title and receive a custom-fitted New Belgium commuter bike in exchange. The selected candidate will chronicle the trials and triumphs along their car-free journey. The volunteer is chosen after submitting a video or essay describing their desire to live car-free. For more information, log onto http://www.followyourfolly.com/pdf/biketrade.pdf.

As part of the Car-for-Bike Trade Program, each Tour de Fat stop will have a funeral for the departed car complete with a Mardi Gras-esque funeral procession. This funeral will be followed, later in the day, by a celebration of the arrival of the Car-for-Bike volunteer’s custom commuter bike.

At the Team Wonderlounge, participants can join Team Wonderbike, New Belgium’s bicycling commuter advocacy program. Team Wonderbikers pledge to commute by bike, not car, as often as possible. Currently, 11,000 people have pledged not to drive 9 million miles in the next twelve months.

Tour de Fat 2008 has a new revival stage for performers with 100% solar-powered sound and decorations made from recycled materials. The stage will be transported in solar-powered trailers and the Tour de Fat crew will travel on B100 biodiesel fuel.

Festival-goers can participate in the pre-event bicycle parade and try out new rideable art bikes

This year, two people and a guest each will win a trip to Tour de Fat in Fort Collins, Colorado for the home-town throw-down (California exempt). For a chance to win, log onto http://www.newbelgium.com/vibe_tourdefat.php.

This is a pro-bike celebration, not an anti-car rally…non-cyclists are more than welcome to join the festivities.
What:
Tour de Fat

When:
Saturday, June 21

Where:
Palmer Square Park, at the corner of Palmer and Kedzie, in Chicago’s 35th Ward. Special thanks to Alderman Rey Colón for helping secure a location for Tour de Fat Chicago.

Schedule:
9:00 a.m. - Bike Parade Registration10:00 a.m. - Bike Parade
11:00 a.m. - “Slow-Down or Throw-Down” Slow-Ride Competition
12:00 p.m. - Performances Begin
1:30 p.m. - “Carpocalypse Now” – Funeral procession for the car belonging to the Car-for-Bike Trade volunteer
3:30 p.m. – Car-for-Bike Trade Celebration
4:00 p.m. - Curtain Closes

Bands:
PaperBird and Mucca Pazza
Check ‘em out at http://sonicbids.com/epk/epk.aspx?epk_id=123837 and http://www.mucca-pazza.org/.

Tour de Fat 2008 will cycle through each of the following cities:

June 21: Chicago, IL

July 19: San Francisco, CA

July 26 : Truckee, CA

Aug. 2: Seattle, WA

Aug. 16: Portland, OR

Aug. 23: Boise, ID

Sept. 6: New Belgium Brewing (Ft. Collins, CO)

Sept. 13: Denver, CO

Sept. 20: Durango, CO

Oct. 11: Tempe, AZ

Oct. 18: Austin, TX
Don’t know what to expect?
To see last year’s stop in Ft. Collins and to learn more about the Car-for-Bike Trade Program log onto http://www.tour-de-fat.com/. For more information on New Belgium, visit www.newbelgium.com.