You know what its like, you finish a great book and desparately try to find something equally as good to stick your nose into. I didn't have a book lined up so I wandered into Waterstones, passed Michael Palin doing a book signing and bought 'Eddy Merckx the Cannibal' by Daniel Friebe.
I should have bought Michael Palin's book on Brazil because the Eddy Merckx book didn't match my expectations. I'm not sure what I like about cycling books, maybe revelations like Tyler Hamilton's, perhaps epic rides (possible challenges to consider), great stories or insights, or suggestions on technical improvements. Either way Daniel Friebe's book on Merckx didn't tick my boxes and I think because it lacked any input from the great man.
In defence of Daniel Friebe, he does state that he tried to involve Merckx but his requests were rejected because of an official autobiography being written. I wish I'd waited.
I did, however, also find a fun book on Kindle which was well worth the 77 pence...
Dave Barter - Obsessive compulsive cycling disorder.
Basically the book is a blog, which appealed to me. Whilst reading I realised that Dave was similar to myself; a lot of mountain biking progressing to road cycling and trying to find challenges and building the bike and training for the goal. I liked it.
It also sparked the competitive instinct in me; I read about Dave's average speed on his road rides and they were similar to mine. But then I read about his trip up Ventoux and half-wheeling his friend with a final time to the top of 1hr 30mins. I had to read it again. My time in 2011 was under 2hrs and I'd have to train some to knock 30 minutes off that. How did Dave do it?
I looked at the Kindle book cover and then saw why...he's a (sub 12st) whippet.
www.phased.co.uk
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