A Race for Madmen
By Chris Sidwells
Here at the L2P, we're always on the eye out for a new book to keep us company in the evenings. We'd been waiting in anticipation for the release of Chris Sidwells new book, A race for Madmen: the extraordinary history of the Tour de France since we found out he'd got to work on it. Chris Sidwells is a renowned cycling journalist who has often written about The London-Paris. We think you'll enjoy his new book.
The Tour de France has always featured in my life. Strangely, for an ordinary English kid growing up in a northern mining village, the Tour de France was talked about it a lot in our house. That's because my uncle was Britain's first yellow jersey in the race, Tom Simpson. Then, while I was still very young Tom died in the Tour. The race left a scar and a fascination, neither of which have truly healed.
When I was in my teens I wanted to take part in the Tour, but although I won some races my efforts were half-hearted. I know that now, because after making a career change seven years ago I became a cycling journalist. I have covered the Tour, and have got to know its riders, the champions and the also-rans. I now know what it takes to compete in the most demanding, challenging, difficult but at the same time most beautiful, race in the world, and I didn't have it.
Race for Madmen is my take on the story of the Tour de France. It's a history book, but a history book where the narrative is supplied in equal parts by me and by the people who have taken part. The reason I did that was because, as well as the scenery, the mountains, the spectacular backdrop of France, it's the racers who make this race what it is. They are warriors, every last one of them.
The book begins before the Tour was born, and ends with the 2009 edition. I wrote it during 2009, but it contains stories that I've collected during my work in cycling over the last seven years. These come from many diverse sources, including interviews with Eddy Merckx, Johan Bruyneel, Jean Bobet and Dominique Anquetil, plus many, many others.
The book was a labour of love. The Tour has had problems. It still has some, and will face many more. But there is still a heroism about the Tour, flawed sometimes, but then people generally are. And in the end I think that is the attraction of the Tour de France. It is spectacular, there are heroic moments, both at the front and back of the field, but it is also intensely human.
The author, Chris Sidwells
The Tour shows all its human flaws. It can't hide them inside a tunnelled dressing room, it isn't played inside closed stadiums; the Tour takes place out in the open, in the people's streets and along their roads. It's the people's race. That is the essence of the Tour de France, and that is what I've tried to capture in A Race for Madmen.
A Race for Madmen: the extraordinary history of the Tour de France
Written by Chris Sidwells
Published by Harper Collins on 27 May 2010
ISBN; 978-0-00-732141-4
It's available from all good book shops, as well as from Amazon: click here.