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Home > Tour de Lance: The Extraordinary Story of Lance Armstrong's Fight to Reclaim the Tour de France
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Tour de Lance: The Extraordinary Story of Lance Armstrong's Fight to Reclaim the Tour de France
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By Bill Strickland
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 (9 Reviews)
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Publisher:
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Crown
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Published:
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December 31, 1969 |
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Binding:
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Hardcover
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Pages:
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320
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Lance Armstrong is a worldwide icon, indisputably one of the greatest cyclists who has ever lived. After battling cancer and becoming an inspiration to millions, Armstrong won the Tour de France a record-breaking seven consecutive years before retiring from competition in 2005.
Four years later, at thirty-seven, Armstrong decided to come out of retirement and go for the win yet again. He was racing for no salary, in a season when his greatest rival--Tour de France, Tour of Italy, and Tour of Spain champion Alberto Contador--was on his own team. The twenty-five-year-old Spaniard had been handpicked by Armstrong's own mentor, Johan Bruyneel, to be his successor. Now he would be his fiercest competition. Armstrong was about to suffer like never before--and, for the first time in recent memory, appear to be human on a bicycle.
After seven Tour victories--and beating cancer--did Lance Armstrong really need to prove anything? Beyond the thrill of another possible victory, what drove him to race again? What was he seeking--and would he find it?
Cycling insider Bill Strickland had unprecedented access to Armstrong, Johan Bruyneel, and the team. He takes readers behind the scenes during the 2009 racing season and along for the ride on the Tour de France with a dramatic mile-by-mile account. Offering a penetrating and candid glimpse into the man behind the myth, Tour de Lance goes beyond a single season or a single race to reveal the heart of the sport and the soul of the cyclist.
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Customer Reviews:
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 No Real New Insight, June 18, 2010
By Do I Hear '8'! (Phoenix, AZ)
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I was really disappointed with this book. Every year I grab the cycling book featured right before the Tour. This was the worst of the bunch. Strickland has an interesting take on Lance. He's not really supportive of him, but admires his all the same. He starts the book eluding to the fact he discovered some not-so-flattering things about Armstrong, but follows it up with an 'I'm not going to tell you what they are' disclaimer. And he doesn't.
Everything in this book was a re-hash of what any above-average cycling fan (meaning, you watch more cycling races than just the Tour) already knows. The stories, quotes and 'behind the scenes' gossip have already been reported. If Strickland did have unique access to Armstrong and the team during the comeback, none of the unique insight you would expect turned up in this book. I could have written 95% of this book from news articles I read over the last 18 months.
The one bright aspect of the book was his insight into Johan Bruyneel's style as Director of a Pro-Tour cycling Team, especially during stages of the Tour. By the end of the book, I actually thought it should have been marketed as a Contador vs Armstrong story and how Bruyneel was able to manage their egos.
Don't buy this book if you are looking for any unique insight into the science, training or 'behind the scenes' anecdotes of Armstrong's comeback. If you are looking for some light reading to get ready for the 2010 Tour de France, grab it, it's a quick read.
15 of 22 people found the above review helpful.
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 beautiful book by unbiased writer, June 28, 2010
By ez
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Lance Armstrong is a polarizing figure, and authors of books about him capitalize on this by aiming to either take him down (see Walsh, David) or kiss his behind (see Wilcockson, John). This book is a rare exception (as is the excellent "Lance Armstrong's War" by Dan Coyle). Strickland is an amazing writer. If you love cycling, you'll find that 50, 80, 100 pages go by before you look up from this book. It doesn't matter that last season was well chronicled by other outlets. Strickland could write about a race you've seen 10 times, and you'd still come away with fresh insight and appreciation for what it takes to race a bicycle.
13 of 15 people found the above review helpful.
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Great Read!, July 3, 2010
By bookgirl
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I've read a lot of books on both Lance and the Tour. This book ranks up there with the best. I loved the first person perspective - I felt like I was right there with them. The Tour starts today and this book totally got me excited to watch. Go Lance!
5 of 5 people found the above review helpful.
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The Evolution of Lance Armstrong, August 26, 2010
By E-Cowboy
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One of the things that I love about professional cycling is the many layers that are at play over the course of a Grand Tour. Perhaps if you're a hardcore cycling fan - you know the summiting record for Alpe d'Huez or can name the Lanterne Rouge from the past three Tour de Frances - Strickland's book might fall short in terms of ultimate insider information. However, as a cycling enthusiast, I wasn't disappointed in the details and Tour insights, strategies, and tactics that Strickland wrote about in "Tour de Lance".
This book is an interesting look at the evolution of Lance Armstrong, how he started in professional cycling and changed (matured?) over the course of his career. It's an insightful revelation about how his celebrity status in recent years has impacted him and ultimately what drove him to hop back on the saddle.
There were a few times throughout the book when Strickland got away from Armstrong and instead focused on the people who have become cycling fans because of him. While it was interesting to read about the impact that Lance has had on the sport, in those sections, I felt like Strickland's writing was a little over-the-top and could've been more concise.
All in all though, "Tour de Lance" is an interesting book on the sport of cycling and the worldwide celebrity that Lance Armstrong has become.
4 of 4 people found the above review helpful.
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 Left a lot to be desired..., July 1, 2010
By Jim Austin (Wylie, TX USA)
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Strickland chooses to write this book in the first person. It's a poor choice. By comparison, renowned sports photographer and photojournalist Elizabeth Kreutz's work is included in Comeback 2.0: Up Close and Personal which covers the same period in Lance's journey. Imagine how heavy-handed and off-putting a photo essay work would look were the photographer to show up in all of the athlete's pictures. She was smarter than to take that approach. Unfortunately, Strickland was not.
This is much more a voyeur's look at Lance's comeback, which is what generates the genuine criticism that there is nothing being told that is really new here. Strickland is a strong writer though. He can (and does) describe the cycling jacket that he is wearing, right down to the cut and function of its zipper. If you don't mind reliving Lance's comeback through a bystander's eyes, this book will likely read well and with some measure of appeal. In that respect, I agree with those who have so well received this book. Strickland clearly loves cycling. There is no better measure of writing about something that you love than to do it in the first person. Where this book falls apart for many, and quickly, is that Strickland admits no love of Lance Armstrong, particularly not of his attempt at a comeback.
3 of 5 people found the above review helpful.
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TEN Stars!! WOW what a great book!!!, July 14, 2010
By MotherLodeBeth (Sierras of California)
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Only a wonderful author like Bill Strickland who has written for Bicycling magazine and has ridden and race throughout the world could have written a book like this. Talk about a book that grabs your attention from the cover to the inside photos to the ins and outs of the sport, including the results from the various races he covers in the book. And living in the Sierras near Nevada City and knowing the Nevada City Classic in June 2009 (and the recent race) which was 44 miles, made the book even more interesting.
And that reminded me of the opening page of the book Tour de France, Stage 1 Individual Time Trial, 15.5 km, Monaco July 4, 2009. " Here he is, Lance Armstrong. And there he goes: a blue and yellow-and-white figure on a black-and-yellow bike streaking over the gray surface of a road in Monaco late on a summer morning, the sun's yellow pale in comparison to the shoulders of his jersey, the sky's blue nothing more than the original idea for the magnificent tones that wrap around his back and legs.'
That's exactly the vision I remembered from Nevada City, where he whizzed by so fast that one had to remind themselves that indeed he had just ridden by. It was also the race that when he went thru Sacramento would involve some thief stealing one of his bikes which made local and national news.
So if you are the least bit interested in bike racing or Lance Armstrong and information and commentary you wont find just anywhere, then please buy and read this wonderful book.
1 of 1 people found the above review helpful.
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2009 Tour Recap plus Jilted Love story, March 10, 2011
By David Holoman (Raleigh, NC USA)
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This book is a recap of the 2009 Tour de France. The fact that you can't tell that that's what the book is from the title is one of a number of issues with this book.
Oddly enough, this book is a love story between the author and Lance. It's by no means the gushy "Lance is the greatest, Lance is dreamy" motif-- It's a lot more complicated than that-- more like a once and future love, with a lot of soul-searching and unresolved conflict in the middle.
Or put another way, there is way, Way, WAY too much Bill Strickland in this book. A first-person account is going to end up revealing a bit about the author, but the there are just too many passages about the life times of Bill, and again, sorry, but who cares?
Another strike against this work is that the storycraft isn't very good: the first several chapters alternate between the first half-dozen or so 2009 TdF stages on the one hand, and the other 2009 races that were used to prepare for the tour. Seasick yet? Whiplash? Not to worry, the last 14 stages of the TdF were consolidated into one chapter.
I thought Strickland was excessively condescending to those with casual or popular interest in Lance-- not Billish enough, I guess. Finally, the language is a good deal coarser than the occasion warrants. The needless vulgarities are just tiresome, and telling.
A last strike against this book is that has flagrantly tacked-in magazine articles that are complete non-sequitors to the rest of the book. A blind person could see them.
I gave this book the stars I did because it is likely to be authoritative written version of the 2009 Tour, and it does reveal the interesting behind-the-scenes drama that unfolds as impossible situational mechanics unfold. I like reading Feinstein's accounts of golf better than watching the golf itself. I'd still rather watch the biking, but I did enjoy reading a text account of it, even if it was not particularly well done.
1 of 2 people found the above review helpful.
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My Wife Loved This Book, September 16, 2010
By Retired (Linden, Michigan)
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I bought this book as a gift for my wife. She loves Lance and this book was exactly what she wanted. Good read according to my wife.
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it's good, very good, July 25, 2010
By Robert B. Kidd (Rhode Island)
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Bill Strickland writes like a painter who uses long, slow strokes to create an image. You have to be patient, but he does a thorough job before the book is over.
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