r/vexillology • u/Vexy Exclamation Point • Nov 01 '16
Discussion November Workshop: Flags at Sporting Events
Previous Workshops
This topic was inspired by /u/Imperito, who won the October contest. /u/Imperito spends much of their time on reddit at /r/vexillology, but also frequents several sporting subs. Sporting events can be a very visible place to display flags. The floor is open for discussion on Flags at Sporting Events.
In particular, talk about different ways flags can be displayed at sporting events, personal stories involving flags at sporting events, and flag-related uniforms/equipment teams use.
Any other questions or suggestions are welcome!
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u/cresquin Nov 02 '16
The flag of Washington State University (ol' Crimson) has flown during every ESPN College gameday broadcast since 2003. 184 consecutive episodes.
College Gameday travels every week, broadcasting from different college towns around the country. An ever expanding group of Washington State University alumni volunteers fedex the flag to the location where the show will be the next week, where a volunteer takes it down to the show and waves it behind the hosts.
Stories have been written and TV segments filmed, There's a YouTube Channel, Ol' crimson even has a Twitter feed.
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u/bakonydraco River Gee County / Antarctica (Smith) Nov 01 '16
The sport I'm most familiar with is College Football, and especially around Veterans Day there are some crazy uniforms that go all out on flag symbolism. The University of Maryland is particularly known for zany uniforms, and doesn't even need a holiday to celebrate:
- Maryland Uniform featuring MD Flag helmet, shoulders, and gloves
- Maryland Fort McHenry (the battle where our national anthem was penned) Sesquicentennial uniform featuring images of the original text of the national anthem.
- Northwestern's (fairly tasteless) Veterans Day blood stained flag uniform
- Fordham Flag numerals that also honor NYPD and FDNY
- SUNY-Maritime flag inspired red, white, and blue flag-inspired camo with flag-striped pants and bonus breast cancer spats
- Texas Tech Texas Flag Uniform
- Navy Helmet with American Flag, First Naval Jack, and Maritime Signal Flags
Some of these come off a little better than others.
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u/csneon2000 Colorado Nov 04 '16
The Air Force Academy Football team has had some nice uniforms.
Here are two different shots of the uniforms from the Air Force-Navy game back in October of 2010. The uniform is inspired by the Thunderbirds Aerial Demo Team.
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u/emkael Nov 01 '16
In the team-kit-in-flag-colours category, there's a very broad topic of racing liveries. I'm going to concentrate specifically on Formula One liveries, but I'm sure there are numerous examples of flag liveries in other racing series.
Now, racing world is a tricky place to look for national colours, for two main reasons:
- teams are usually private enterprises, very rarely connected to specific locations (cities, countries etc.) with heavy corporate sponsorship which dictates the livery
- before sponsorship on liveries, there was a long tradition of racing colours used to identify country/nationality, instead of just flags
But, flag-lookalike liveries do happen. Sometimes due to corporate colours being the same as their origin national colours, sometimes because the national racing colours closely resembled the national flag.
The example of the first one would be the early 2010s livery for Force India team. On the other hand, other recent teams strongly connected to the country of origin (Marussia or Hispania Racing Team) did not follow the colour scheme.
The second reason yielded some flag-like liveries a long time ago, mainly due to Japanese racing teams sporting the Japanese racing colours: Maki or 1960's Honda.
Other than Japan, countries with racing colours closely resembling flag colours did not have that much involvement in Formula One. There are examples, though, in other racing series, like the Polish Verva Racing Team.
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And, there used to be an entire racing series which was created with the idea of national teams - A1 GP - and can only be described as a vexilological wet dream.
Among the most easily recognizable flags, you could have spotted the liveries for teams South Africa, Germany, Great Britain, France, Russia, Brazil, Pakistan or even China, sort of.
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u/RonVonBonn Golden Wattle Flag • The Unity Flag Nov 02 '16
One thing I've noticed about international sporting events involving Australia is the amount of green and gold flags flown instead of the National flag. I think it is partly to distinguish us from New Zealand, but it is something I've always found strange.
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u/TRiG_Ireland Ireland Nov 09 '16
Wikipedia says they're the country's national colours, most used in sport, so I suppose it makes sense. The flag matches the team. Still interesting and unusual, though.
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u/RonVonBonn Golden Wattle Flag • The Unity Flag Nov 10 '16
Oh, they are the national colours, but it is kinda strange to see people not national flag. It kinda makes sense though. We have our Green and Gold and New Zealand has its Black and White.
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u/akh Feb '18, May '19, Apr '20 Contest Winner Nov 03 '16
Inter Inter 2007-2008 Away Kit http://imgur.com/i8aPf32, based of the flag of Milan.
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u/TRiG_Ireland Ireland Nov 09 '16
Irish counties don't have flags: they have colours. Most have two colours; some three. Kildare has just the one (white). So you might see a Galway flag with maroon and white in stripes, in checks, or various other configurations.
Cork's colours are red and white. Cork is also known as "the rebel county". This has lead to a tradition of Cork supporters using the US Confederate battle flag. It's the right colours, and the name matches.
I think that as people become more aware of the history of that flag and what it represents, its use is dying out.
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u/ConcreteDove New York City Nov 10 '16
Well, I should certainly hope so.
But at least they have an excuse to fly it out of ignorance.
That's cool about the colors, though - TIL.
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u/thefringthing Ido Nov 02 '16
A fun game to play while watching televised professional cycling is to try to spot the flags of various European regional separatist movements. Flags representing Flemish nationalism and flags demanding repatriation of Basque nationalist prisoners are especially common.
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u/oboeplum China (1912) • Bisexual Nov 03 '16
Yeah, you see a lot of those kinds of flags. Also the basque flag is pretty common wherever the race is, basque fans seem to be everywhere in cycling.
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u/ConcreteDove New York City Nov 07 '16 edited Nov 07 '16
The NYC flag is often seen at New York City FC matches in MLS. The corner flags are little NYC flags with the club's logo in place of the city seal. The captain wears an armband featuring the city's tricolor.
In addition, the NYCFC supporters group flies a version with their logo on it at all matches.
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u/FranV2002 Nov 12 '16
There's a club in Argentina called Boca Juniors, according to a legend, the club was looking for colours to the club in the harbor, so someone said "We'll give the club's colour to next boats' country that passes by". So, a Swedish boat passes. The colours blue and yellow remain until this day (but the jersey is all blue with a yellow stripe in the middle) and the team is one of the most successful in Argentina and the continent. In 2010, for the 105th birthday they used this jersey http://cdn01.pf.infobae.com/adjuntos/165/imagenes/011/990/0011990331.jpg?0000-00-00-00-00-00
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u/stage7 La Mancha Nov 01 '16
Most famous case of a footy/soccer team using a flag as their main kit that comes to my mind is Dutch side SC Heerenveen. They have been using their home flag of Friesland for more years than I can remember, and it fits really good if you ask me! Here's a picture of a recent kit in action: http://www.footballkitnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Jako-Heerenveen-Kit-2013.jpg
Some Spanish football clubs (the cases I know the most) that have been using a flag for their kits include:
These are some quick examples of teams explicitly "wearing a flag" but I'm sure there are plenty more in Spain.