Insults for the international ultrarunner and/or idiot in your life

A few lucky among you may be fortunate enough to have races overseas planned for 2017. Lucky you. But even if you are not going to run UTMBFE, you may come across foreign runners in your local races here in the USA. Sure, you can wave a polite "hello", but what fun is that? If you really want to make an impression, hurl a friendly insult adding a dash of profanity in their direction.   

French


Unsurprisingly, there are a lot of clever insults in French. Of course, most are exceedingly difficult for the non-speaker to remember or pronounce. Among these are
  • Con comme ses pieds - he's as stupid as his feet [1], which for ultra runners, is saying a lot!
  • T'es une poule mouillée - you're a wet chicken [1], meaning a coward.
  • Casse toi - f*ck off [2]. 
Fortunately, there is only one word you need to remember in French, and it's not ménage à trois, which only happens in music videos. It's putain! Apply anywhere, anytime.

Best instructional video to watch before your Paris Marathon

Italian

No doubt that if you come across Italian runners, you'll have plenty of necessities to shout obscenities at them. Apply with a liberal dose of hand gestures [3]


  • Stronzo - turd, for someone who's arrogant and doesn't care about others, or for someone who's about to drop one in the bush
  • Cavolo - literally this just means cabbage, but when used with the proper attitude, it's a light-hearted curse word like "heck/hell"
    • “Che cavolo tu?” - what the cabbage/hell do you want?
  • Cazzo - shit.
  • Coglione - testicle or idiot, your choice.
  • Cesso - toilet, meaning ugly

German


 German curse words and insults have the advantage of not just sounding similar to a lot of English words, but funny in their own right.

 The 101 version [4]
  • Arschloch/aushole - pretty much what you think it means, asshole. 
    • Was für ein Arschloch - what a complete asshole.
  • Waschlappen - a dishrag, or a wussy
  • Penner - fucker
  • der Motherfucker - "der" makes it a masculine word, in case you were confused. 
  • Scheiss - shit
  • Du gehst mir voll auf den Sack! - You're really busting my balls. If you haven't guessed, Sack means balls. Germans do have a sense of humor, right?
And the graduate school version [5]
  • Einzeller - a single cell person
  • Klappspaten - a folding shovel, or an idiot, because while a folding shovel looks sort of like a shovel and functions like a shovel, you feel like an idiot using it.
  • Evolutionbremse - an evolution brake is a stupid person of dubious genetic makeup that is bound to halt all evolution.
  • Bewegungslegastheniker - this tongue and eye-twister refers to a movement dyslexic, or clumsy person
Out of my way, Bewegungslegastperderrfftttf!

English

The English, while they may have invented the language that we use everyday in America, kept some of their most colorful, or should I say colourful, swear words for themselves [6][7]. The English have a hundred different subtle ways to insult idiots - keep in mind they've dealt with Parliament far longer than we've dealt with Congress.
  • Muppet - a dimwit. 
  • Chav - a low class lower/white-trash
  • Billy no-mates - someone with no friends
  • Pillock - a clumsy idiot
  • Tosser - a jerk who engages in too much self-stimulation


 And even if you do insult them, you can "apologize" while continuing to insult them. Don't believe me? Here are 65 uses of "sorry" by the English, with none of them apologizing for anything.

Irish


If you've got an "angry leprechaun" in your ultrarunning life like I do, try these out and let me know how it goes
  • Gowl. Depending on the region of Ireland, this refers to some sort of idiot, oaf, clumsy idiot, female genitalia or a combination of all of the above. [8]
  • Dryshite. You're just no fun, no value and you bring nothing to the table apart from your gloomy disposition and the puss on your face. And it's really fun to say. [9]

Japanese

I know from personal experience that a lot of you have a hard time distinguishing between a Japanese, Chinese, Korean or other, by appearance or speech. So save yourself the embarrassment of saying konichiwa when you should have said ni hao. Instead, get one of these kanji quotes for your next cool Asian tattoo. The last three describe me accurately in just a few kanjis. [10]
どけ!
doke!
Get out of the way!
あほ
aho
Fool! Idiot! Moron!
屁こき
hekoki
Farter
くそじじい
kusojijii
Old fart/Unpleasant old man


Australian


Shit's about to get real. Australians practice advanced level profanity and insults. You could call a guy "ya c*nt" but he'd take it as a term of endearment. It's also how you might get addressed during a job interview, as in, "so, why do ya want this job, ya c*nt?"  But here are a few terms specific for the slow Aussie runners in your path. [11][12]

  • Wombat - a fat slow and lazy idiot, basically any ultrarunner that''s slower than me, unlike all those speedy c*nts ahead of me
  • Drogo - another word for an idiot or loser, but named after a slow horse who never won a race
  • Budgie smuggler - okay, this is not an insult, but a brilliant name for a speedo

'Murican

Many of us live on one coast or the other and fly over the large chunk of the country affectionately known as 'Murica. It's really a shame because there are a lot of great trails and ultrarunners there. If you do happen to meet some runners there or in your local races, try out some of these good-natured insults. And after you get out of the hospital, do let us know how they worked out in the comments section. [13]
  • You fell out of the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down
  • He's as happy as a puppy with two peckers
  • It's hotter than a goat’s butt in a pepper patch 
  • You're as useless as tits on a bull 
  • You're as useless as a one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest
  • You're as nervous as a long tailed cat in a room full of rockin' chairs
  • You strike me as a Hillary Clinton voter

Redneck athlete in action

References

[1] http://www.thelocal.fr/20161005/twelve-french-insults-wed-love-to-have-in-english
[2] https://www.talkinfrench.com/french-curse-words-nsfw/
[3] http://www.thelocal.it/20160916/eight-great-rude-italian-terms-that-just-dont-translate
[4] http://marathonsprachen.com/swearing-and-words-of-aggression-in-german/
[5] http://learnoutlive.com/funny-german-insults/
[6] http://www.anglotopia.net/anglophilia/british-english-the-top-50-most-beautiful-british-insults/
[7] http://www.bbcamerica.com/anglophenia/2013/02/10-british-insults-americans-wont-understand
[8] http://www.slang.ie/mobile/index.php?entry=gowl&PHPSESSID=a824c44a8857a54b0e5db14784ab9808
[9] https://lovindublin.com/feature/best-irish-curse-words
[10] http://www.sljfaq.org/afaq/insults.html
[11] https://www.thrillist.com/travel/nation/australian-profanity-how-to-swear-like-an-australian
[12] http://www.wanowandthen.com/slang.html
[13] http://grammar.yourdictionary.com/slang/redneck-slang-words.html






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