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    Cycling Book Review Thread

    I thought I may start a cycling book review thread given how many people interested in cycling we have here. I'll write up a review of The Rider and Sweat of the Gods soon but what prompted me to start this thread is I saw that John Foot, author of Calcio has written a history of Italian cycling called Pedalare! Pedalare! and was wondering if anyone had had a look at it.

    Calcio was a really good book and I'm a little suprised to see that he is a specialist in Italian history as opposed to a football specialist. So my doubts about a football writer writing about cycling have been pretty much assuaged.

    #2
    Cycling Book Review Thread

    The OTF peloton discussed a number of cycling books on OldTF; there's a three page thread that might be worth checking out here.

    Oh, and a load of cycling books appeared in this "top five sports books" thread on here.

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      #3
      Cycling Book Review Thread

      Ricky Lenin wrote:
      I thought I may start a cycling book review thread given how many people interested in cycling we have here. I'll write up a review of The Rider and Sweat of the Gods soon but what prompted me to start this thread is I saw that John Foot, author of Calcio has written a history of Italian cycling called Pedalare! Pedalare! and was wondering if anyone had had a look at it.

      Calcio was a really good book and I'm a little suprised to see that he is a specialist in Italian history as opposed to a football specialist. So my doubts about a football writer writing about cycling have been pretty much assuaged.
      Thanks. I'd not heard of that new John Foot title. Bloomsbury have a good track record with their sports literature, so I'm hoping it lives up to expectations.

      Cycling does tend to throw up a lot of high quality publications and there's so many I haven't got round to sampling. I'm sure the last one I read was the Robert Millar biography by Richard Moore. Very good and worth a look.

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        #4
        Cycling Book Review Thread

        Anyone read David Byrne's book on cycling? I gave it to a cycling-obsessed friend on his birthday 18 months ago (he's also a Talking Heads fan), but he hasn't mentioned it since, and I'm afraid to ask him if he liked it in case it was shit, but he's too polite to say.

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          #5
          Cycling Book Review Thread

          Not a huge cycling fan and haven't read too many books on the topic, but the Escape Artist was simply magnificent. Definitely one of the best books I've ever read.

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            #6
            Cycling Book Review Thread

            Just finished this. Very good.

            http://www.amazon.co.uk/Slaying-Badger-LeMond-Hinault-Greatest/dp/0224082906/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1307004501&sr=1-1

            Interesting that the author talks first hand to Hinault and Lemond (no easy feat) plus many of the major players of that time. The first part of the book is more biographical of the two giants while the second half deals with the climax at the Tour in 86 (which ended with the La Vie Claire team almost split in two).

            As someone who only began watching Le Tour in 1987, it makes me more frustrated than ever that I missed this one. Sounded like it was up there with the best of them, and very much the end of an era as the book suggests.

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              #7
              Very much enjoyed Harry Pearson's The Beast, The Emperor, and The Milkman following the cycling season in Flanders (it's arguably a travel book as much as a cycling book). It's not as full of laughs as much of Pearson's writing, but it's still really good and he clearly loves Belgium and following cycling, even though at times it sounds very wet and cold. The only problem I had with it (and this is my problem, not the book's), is that for some reason I seem to have a mental challenge recalling Flemish names, so each time I am left uncertain whether such and such a character has been introduced to me before. Did we already have a Planckaert? This Van Looy, have we encountered him before?

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                #8
                Ha! Ms Felicity has that problem with Dutch footballers - in the late 90s we used to assume/pretend there were more than two De Boers and just add a Reggie etc to their extended family.

                Pearson's travel book about Belgium is very good: Tall Man in a Flat Land, and has quite a bit on cycling.

                Tim Moore 's travel books on bikes are great IMO. The Last one I read- 'The Cyclist who came in from the Cold' he traces the route of "the Iron Curtain" on a poor quality DDR-era folding bike

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                  #9
                  I've read one of the Tim Moore books - Giro-Nimo - which was entertaining enough, but perhaps seemed a little too focused on the gimmick.

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                    #10
                    Pearson on cycling I have to read, thanks for the heads up. He has a nice piece about Niki Terpstra in the 2018 Road Book (cycling's version of Wisden).

                    ad hoc, I think there are at least three Planckaerts currently active in cycling, it's quite a Jones-like name, so it's understandable.

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                      #11
                      I found Giro-Nimo a bit samey, the bicycle broke so much it ended up smothering the narrative and I just kept thinking "oh great, another couple of pages on the necessary repairs". The Iron Curtain book was much better, nice mix of travelogue, observation and history.

                      I'd like to disagree with Arturo's eight and a half year old review of Slaying the Badger up thread. The author did well to get an interview with LeMond in particular given that it was about a decade ago during his period of isolation from the sport. The problem with the book is that there's too much background and it's well past half way before we get to the start of the race itself, then what there is on the race doesn't have a great deal of new material if you've read plenty about it before. Might be better for those less familiar with the story. It does however reinforce my belief that the cycling book I'd most to be published is a LeMond autobiography. (Back in the day Samuel Abt wrote a book which was essentially an authorised biography but that ends at the 1990 Tour de France)

                      My sister bought me Peter Sagan's book for Christmas, which I'm sure I'll enjoy because Sagan, but it didn't get particularly good reviews on release. It's in a large pile of books to read so it'll be a while before I get to it. Currently half way through David Millar "The Racer" which I keep reading in his voice.

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                        #12
                        And with your hair artfully messed?

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                          #13
                          Some I've read during lockdown:

                          Lanterne Rouge (Max Leonard) - A survey of some of the riders to have finished last in the Tour. Sensibly he devotes a chapter to various different riders rather than trying to cover every eligible individual. He picks a nice mix and range too, including a rather sad failure to get an interview with Philippe Gaumont.

                          The History of British Cycle Racing (Chris Sidwells) - Good lord, what a mess. Ostensibly a history from the beginning of organised cycle sport through to about 2014. The first two thirds are a fairly procedural run through - not just road, there's a chapter on mountain biking and a bit on track. It's got a lot of factual errors and really needs a better proof read. Then the last third reaches more modern fare - Cavendish, medal factory, Sky, Wiggins - and it turns into a completely different book with a whole new level of detail on everything. Got the sense that this had started life as one book and turned into something else. Also there's no bibliography which a work of this sort really needs, although there were several times I found myself thinking "I know which book you read to gather that information"

                          Butcher, Blacksmith, Acrobat, Sweep (Peter Cossins) - This fills a clear gap in the market as there has never been an English language book specifically about the inaugural Tour de France. There won't be another either as this will be the definitive volume. A lot of research has gone into this but the author manages to avoid it becoming a huge race report, in fact the action itself takes up no more than a quarter of the book and plenty of space is devoted to the various issues and talking points that sprung up. He also does a good job of capturing period atmosphere and the characters surrounding the whole event.

                          Peter Sagan; My World - Well, it's a ghosted autobiography innit? It covers the period from the beginning of 2015 to spring 2018 to capture his three Worlds wins. There's the usual sort of despair (joining Tinkoff and not getting on with his new coach Bobby Julich, being sick before Bergen) leading to eventual redemption. He does come across though as a leader and someone who will look after the people around him "Team Peter". He mainly avoids direct controversy but you can tell he likes van Avermaet, respects Cavendish and repeatedly damns Kittel with faint praise. Also you're left wondering if this is all the real Peter Sagan or if it's all a persona. (Or "Colin Hunt" as Ray occasionally describes him)

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                            #14
                            Thanks Longeared. Fairly clear which are potential Kindle pickups and which aren’t!

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                              #15
                              I read Cossins' Full Gas last year, a pretty entertaining read about the development of tactics in cycling and how approaches have changed over the years.

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                                #16
                                Both Tim Moore’s grand tour books were good. I also enjoyed Climbs and Punishment as a light read.

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                                  #17
                                  Incandenza how far back does it go for tactics? Is it a history of the sport thing or the past X years? I'd probably be equally interested in both given that a smaller focus would allow for greater detail. And is it tour focussed?

                                  redkyle81 aren't there 3 Moore tour books?

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                                    #18
                                    He has three cycling travel books but only two of them are based around actual races. That was the distinction I was trying to make.

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                                      #19
                                      Originally posted by Levin View Post
                                      Incandenza how far back does it go for tactics? Is it a history of the sport thing or the past X years? I'd probably be equally interested in both given that a smaller focus would allow for greater detail. And is it tour focussed?
                                      Yes, I'd say it's very tour focused. I flipped through it again after seeing your post, I guess it's not so much a history of tactics itself, but it starts with early tours/Classics, then goes to the 1960s and 1970s, but then each chapter after that deals with different approaches about specific aspects of a race--mountains, sprints, riding in the peloton, etc. There are a lot of interviews with retired and current cyclists, so that's interesting. I was also pleased to see him discussing women's cycling as well instead of ignoring it.

                                      Here's a review: https://www.theguardian.com/books/20...cossins-review

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