Forget Formula 1. Forget football, and tennis, and that dude with the pistol from the Olympics. The most stylish uniform is thrashing around in the peat and mud up in Braemar |
If you take a flight to Aberdeen, drive about an hour and a half west, then dodge through a crowd of people in kilts and tartan, you can have a front row seat to the sickest sport in the world. And I mean literally front row, because in Braemar, apart from a single stand which usually houses Big King Charles, there are no seats. Fans pile in with fold-out chairs and blankets to sit on the hillside to watch their locals do mad Scottish shit, like toss telephone poles over their heads and swing hammers the size of well-fed seven-year-olds.
Then, halfway through, about eight or nine men will file out, a thick rope worming over their shoulders for the tug of war. It's the same tug of war you used to get waxed at in school, your hands flayed to the bone. Except here, it's unbelievably cool.
The premise is simple. Line up, grab the rope and try to haul the other team over the line while a dude in full tartan regalia screams at you. Same as school, right? Simple games are the best. (NFL, I love you, but what the fuck is an offensive fair-catch kick?) |
So, the dudes are out. They're in roomy cotton rugby shirts. Some are solid, in lilac-y purples, emerald greens or sky blues. Some have a quartered check in black and yellow or striped navy and white. All come with handsome unstructured collars, embroidered crests and long sleeves pushed up to show off stacked forearms. Underneath, simple cotton shorts do heavy lifting. These aren't Mescalian short, nor are they NBA-level bagged out. They're easy, boxy things, made to let quads breathe. Most of the men also wear leather weightlifting belts. Then, thick wool socks and tug-of-war boots, which are kind of like the plastic, beltable shells of roller skates if they came with hiking soles.
The whole effect is cool. Maybe it's the simplicity: no garish commercial sponsors, no performance fabric. Perish the thought of sweat-wicking polyester or perforated ventilation tech. This is the fit you wear to play the Make My Opponent Eat Shit And Die match in the I'm The Strongest Dude On Earth competition. The rough edges do more than any mega-sports sponsor's logo ever could. |
But let us not depart without talking about the cherry on top: the coaches. They are nothing like Pep Guardiola or Mikel Arteta, in respectable zip-up sweaters and pressed trousers. They shout at the players with a sort of coxswain-type vibe, in kilts and sweaters with backwards caps. Some are in military uniform. My favourite team's coaches wore giant black hoodies with TUG OF WAR stamped on the back in size one billion font. I have googled frantically, to no avail.
Anyway, maybe it's just because the whole thing is so joyful and fun. I was there celebrating the Paul Smith loves Barbour collab, so everyone was coming up to talk to the out-of-towners. These uniforms are presumably the stuff they just put on because it's easy and doesn't get in the way of their simple, manly sport, so hearing me go on about how cool they are probably could have come off as funny. But the guy I was stood next to just grinned and suggested I go and join 'em then, go on. And you know what? With a kit like that, maybe I will.
Photography by Adam Weir
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