Omophobic nicknames

This is the brilliant Omobono Tenni, Guzzi works rider and much admired rider, including by Motosimpatico Restorations from whom the pic was shamelessly pinched: as they put it; "surely our patron saint...but‘Omobono’ as a blog title? A bit obscure; postings by confused and angry U2 fans would surely flood in."


Folk often refer to his "Black Devil" nickname, but it turns out Omobono was his real nickname - it means "Good man" and he was christened Tommaso. This sort of thing's common in Italy - Palladio (as in the father of Palladian architecture) was a nickname too.

There's a football stadium in Treviso named after Omobono, he was that loved in his native Italy: the video below showing him racing at the TT tells why, as does a past blog