Cycling Book Reviews :

With the Tour de France launch in Britain : here are some reviews of books being published to coincide with the Tour de France 2007 : as reviewed by William Fotheringham.



In Search of Robert Millar: Unravelling the Mystery Surrounding Britain's Most Successful Tour de France Cyclist
by Richard Moore
352pp, HarperSport, £15.99

Dancing Up Hill: The Cycling Memoirs of Charles Holland, Pioneer of the Tour de France
by Frances Holland
176pp, M and N Publishing, £12.99

Blazing Saddles: The Cruel and Unusual History of the Tour de France
by Matt Rendell
288pp, Quercus, £9.99

The Official Treasures of the Tour de France
by Serge Laget and Luke Edwardes-Evans
64pp, Carlton Books, £30

Vive le Tour: Amazing Tales of the Tour de France
by Nick Brownlee
208pp, Robson, £8.99



It is almost unheard of for any top-class sportsman simply to disappear once their career ends, but that is the unlikely achievement of Robert Millar, Britain's best Tour de France cyclist. Millar emerges once in a blue moon, but then only via email, never by telephone. He tells no one where he is. His whereabouts are the subject of constant speculation: sightings have been reported in Dorset, Devon, Spain, Norwich and New Zealand. A good friend of mine had one of the most recent, in a recreation ground in Daventry. That was half a dozen years ago.

I miss Millar, a humorous, cynical guide in my first four Tours de France, who showed as healthy an appetite for tea and cake as I have ever seen in any cyclist when I once took him mountain biking in the Cotswolds. The Glaswegian's absence will be glaring when the Tour de France starts in central London next weekend. It will be a celebration of this country's history in the great race, and the best of that history was made by Millar: winner of three mountain stages and the only Briton to win the coveted jersey of best climber, or king of the mountains.

As a fellow Scot - who was, as an amateur cyclist, managed briefly by the great man - Richard Moore is well placed to go on the Millar hunt. His quarry proves elusive, but the search is worth the trouble. As might be expected, Moore is excellent on the Glaswegian roots, but as Millar climbs to the cycling heights, Moore keeps pace, through his apprenticeship with the Paris ACBB club (fuelled on E-grade steak), his near-misses in the Tours of Spain and Italy, before finally debunking the tabloid myth that a sex change has turned him into the queen of the mountains.

Here is, probably, the definitive portrait of one of Scotland's greatest sportsmen: obsessively driven, painfully shy. He is a rich subject, with a black, cynical turn of phrase that could only have been born in the city that also spawned Billy Connolly. "Learn to swear in several different languages," Millar said in his guide to Tour survival. "Other riders will appreciate your efforts to communicate."

In contrast is Dancing Up Hill, a biography of Charles Holland, the first Briton to ride the Tour. This is a delicate marriage of commentary from his daughter, Frances, with extracts from Holland's hand-written memoirs, illustrated with memorabilia - including his Olympic medallist's diploma and letters from French fans - found in a suitcase after his death. Holland's career began in the pastoral world of British time-trialling and included the 1932 and 1936 games, but the highlight was an attempt to finish the 1937 Tour that lasted through 14 of the 20 stages, foundering only through extraordinary ill luck when a washer in Holland's pump was melted by the heat at a critical moment. Others might have railed at their fate, but not the plus-foured, Brylcreemed Holland: his stoic acceptance of his ill-fortune seems all too British.

One of Moore's interviewees points out that all top cyclists "have emotional chinks that create the drive to be good, something that caused them to be angry". Millar is uncomfortably eccentric and Holland seems too genteel to ride the Tour, but the race's most recent hero, Lance Armstrong, has emotional canyons, as Matt Rendell shows in the best anecdote in Blazing Saddles.

After clinching his fifth Tour in 2003, Armstrong returned to his team bus after taking the leader's yellow jersey, storming up and down the aisle, punching the seats while spitting out a few choice words: "No one trains like me. No one rides like me. This jersey's mine. I live for this jersey. It's my life. No one's taking it away from me. This ******* jersey's mine."

If you ignore turns of phrase such as his description of the first Tour as "an undeclared congress of Europe's hardiest scrota", Rendell at first rattles readably, Loaded style, through 90 years of sadistic organisers, doping scandals, thugs putting nails on the roads and cyclists battling through mountains on dirt roads.

In the 1990s, however, as the drug issues become better documented, Rendell gets bogged down in haemoglobin counts and computer hard-drives, and he resorts to sweeping generalisations. He needs firmer editing before his conclusion that "the riddle of the Tour will never be solved. Each of us must interpret it as he will ..."

The most eccentric and perhaps the richest of this year's Tour books is the Official Treasures, by Serge Laget and Luke Edwardes-Evans. In part this is a potted history-cum-guide, clearly presented and particularly good on the Tour's origins. But it is the unexpected extras that bring the race alive: detachable facsimiles of memorabilia, such as riders' contracts, dinner menus, grocers' bills, plus little gems such as Salvador Dalí's Tour de France postcard, that will delight neutrals and fans alike.

This is a labour of love, and so is Nick Brownlee's Vive le Tour! an accessible if at first unprepossessing blend of history-lite, helpful explanation and bizarre factoids. Brownlee is blessed with his material: with its picaresque nature, the Tour holds rich pickings for the trivia lover. Three quick examples from another age: Firmin Lambot, who always set off with 500 francs in his pocket in case his bike broke and he had to buy a new one; Eduard Fachleitner, who phoned home every evening to talk to his dog - and my new favourite, Napoleon Paoli.

This Italian rider collided with a donkey in the 1920 race, landed on its back, was carried a kilometre along the road before the creature gave up the ghost and, shortly after getting back on his bike, was hit on the head by a falling rock. Such Grand Guignol episodes are not limited to the distant past. Last year, the Tour witnessed sprinters swapping head-butts at 40mph in the finishing straight, another covered in blood after his arm was cut open by a giant cardboard hand (not included among the Treasures), and a race winner who claimed his positive testosterone test was caused by drinking whisky. Hyde Park has no idea what is about to hit it.

__________________
.."But finally the last thing I’ll say to the people who don’t believe in cycling, the cynics and the sceptics. I'm sorry for you. I’m sorry that you can’t dream big. [I]I'm sorry you don't believe in miracles. You should believe in these athletes, and you should believe in these people. I'll be a fan of the Tour de France for as long as I live. And there are no secrets - this is a hard sporting event and hard work wins it" - Armstrong 2005 TDF
morelike hypocrisy.

Great Armstrong bit. And that scrota line is classic. Looking for this book as we speak.