Beside the fact this book makes the grandeur of the Tour seem a little small, it doesn’t take away from the bizzareness of riding through massive and daunting mountains for days on end. Indeed in bypassing the epicness is does bring out the bizaare, crazy, comical and just pure manicness of the Tour. It shows what length men would go to be labeled success and how far the organisers go to make it enjoyable for the rest of us.
I guess the biggest thing this book showed me was that the tour is comical, pharsical, almost abstract and contrived race. But what sport isn’t? With the organisers endeerments and almost chaotic mood swings sending 200 people into the unkown with one goal – some will behave, some will conform and some will act as they choose to – it is as unpreditcable as anything you could think of.
The tour seems to be devised by a board of people, showing the signs of a race marked with awesome racing at one side, and insane antics at the other. It never seems to be an even affair, with wild doping allergations and brutal physical battering sending all particpants to the edge of the phyke.
Desgrange, the founder of Le Tour, said that “the ultimate tour would be one only one man can finish.” And he set out to set that up. But he may not have considered the length men will go for fame, fortune and to suffer. The book shows that, like life, some will cheat, some will succeed but most will fail.
I found the book to be a great once over read. I leant about heroes of the Tour’s past, famous mountains and crazy antics. The race by race reviews were entertaining and enjoyable, especially since it was all from the start, the very first tour in 1903 – ‘The First Annual Congress of Hardy Crotches’.
Rendell provides witty remarks to match the comedic happenings of each tour and makes reading 104 years of epic cycling history a breeze. The from the lesser known riders to the greatest, every tour gets a write up based on how much information was/is known.
It is presented in way to be devoured and enjoyed – no difficult words; especilly if you know a little Tour-Lore, mountain pronounciation and some of the bigger names of cyclists; and no complicated descriptions. I suspect it would be a handy book to have around all your cycling mates to show them how much you know about the Tour.
In the end, this book will probably be a once read and shelve until I want to refresh my knowledge of Le Tour. It has cemented in my mind that the Tour is simply the hardest race devised by men with crazy minds and raced by men who agree to the terms of annihilation.
We may have carbon bikes and teams built around people, but the Tour will always be what it was. As Desgrange wrote after the riders concquered the Ballon d’Alsace: “my opinion that man’s courage knows no limits and a highly trained athlete can aspire to remarkable performances.” I’d add, ‘if inspired to.‘, and The Tour of France is that inspiration.