No champion has astonished the world quite like Lance Armstrong. A cancer survivor who went on to win the Tour de France an unprecedented seven times, he is an inspiration to millions. Yet few know the complete story of this brash, smart, and fiercely competitive Texan who battled to the top of his sport, overcame the most rampant case of testicular cancer doctors had seen, and then conquered cycling's Holy Grail time after time. In Lance: The Making of the World's Greatest Champion

This beautifully designed and illustrated essential guide to the Tour de France from Motorbooks' Speed Read series will make you an instant expert on its history, its winners and rivalries, the tactics necessary to win it, and the technology of its bicycles.Le Tour has sometimes been called “chess on wheels” because of the complicated strategies used by the race's 22 teams and 176 riders. This book—written by award-winning cycling journalist John Wilcockson, who ha...

Taking place over twenty-three days in July and across more than 2,100 miles of smooth blacktop, rough cobblestones, and punishing mountain terrain, the Tour de France is the most grueling sports event in the world. And in 2004, five-time champion Lance Armstrong set out to achieve what no other cyclist in the 100-year history of the race had ever done: win a sixth Tour de France.Armstrong had four serious challengers who wanted nothing more than to deny the man the French call Le Boss...

Once a superstar in the world of cycling and one of its most interesting personalities, Lance Armstrong is known for pushing his body to the extreme, intimidating his rivals, and breaking the rules. Armstrong's many achievements were consistently dogged by allegations of doping and secrecy, allegations to which the cyclist ultimately acknowledged. Lance takes a long, hard, objective look at Armstrong's life—before his admission of guilt—both on and off the bike, beginning with his...

For eight years, the Tour de France, arguably the world’s most demanding athletic competition, was ruled by two men: Lance Armstrong and Floyd Landis. On the surface, they were feature players in one of the great sporting stories of the age–American riders overcoming tremendous odds to dominate a sport that held little previous interest for their countrymen. But is this a true story, or is there a darker version of the truth, one that sadly reflects the realities of sports in the twenty-fi...

Boy Racer steps behind the scenes of the Tour de France. It unmasks the exotic, contradictory, hysterical and brutal world of professional cycling from the compellingly candid viewpoint of someone right in the thick of it.Written off as 'fat' and 'useless' in his youth, Mark Cavendish is now one of cycling's brightest stars and one of Britain's greatest ever cyclists. Some have called him cocky, but to anyone who doesn't like his style, Mark will simply shrug his shoulders...

New York Times Bestseller: An "intimate, insightful, unflinching" portrait of the cyclist as he trains for—and triumphs in—the Tour de France (Jon Krakauer, New York Times–bestselling author of Into the Wild).This is an extraordinary story of greatness pushed to its limits; a vivid, behind-the-scenes portrait of perhaps the most accomplished athlete of our time as he vies for a historic sixth straight victory in the toughest sporting event...

The autobiography of three time Tour de France Green Jersey winner.Professional road cyclist Robbie McEwen will do whatever it takes to win on a bike. He is proud of his reputation as a 'competitive little bugger' and 'a bit of a hard bastard in the peloton', yet he is at pains to point out that what he's channelling is not rage or aggression but a fierce determination and razor-sharp focus. Here, in his own words, Robbie reveals what has made him one of the most successful road cyclists o...

In ETAPE, critically acclaimed author Richard Moore will take readers on a virtual Tour de France, with each chapter focusing on a single rider in a single stage that came to define the Tour’s history.In Étape, critically acclaimed author Richard Moore tells the stories behind some of the defining stages in the Tour de France’s history through the eyes of the protagonists: the heroes and villains, stars and journeymen.Featuring exclusive new interviews with Mark Cavendish, L...

No sporting event has had its past and present, its highs and lows so intricately entwined with those of a country like the Tour has with France.The Tour de France is the biggest annual sporting event in the world, and at the same time it transcends sport. The Tour de France comes to the people. It passes their houses, it turns right in their village squares, it thunders through their suburban streets and into the hearts of their towns and cities. It is a unique event in that peopl...

Nicolas Roche has a famous surname to all fans of cycling. The son of legendary Irish and World Champion Stephen Roche, Nicolas had to fight to make it as a professional and even harder to make his mark as his own man in this toughest of competitive sports.His rise up the ranks has been meteoric, with top 15 finishes in both the Tour de France and the Vuelta a Espa�a, but his attitude to his chosen profession has remained undimmed. Honest, eloquent and passionate about the cycling ...

The story of a unique athlete's remarkable journey—from riding his bike in the Ngong Hills of Kenya to the sport's pinnacle, victory in the Tour de France.On 21 July 2013 Chris Froome made history as the second British cyclist to win the Tour de France—in the 100th edition of the world's most famous bike race—and the first ever African-born rider to wear the coveted maillot jaune on the top step of the podium in Paris. Froome's path into the elite ranks of road raci...