Book review: It’s not about the bike, by Lance Armstrong

Since I reviewed Tim Krabbé‘s superlative work on amateur cycle racing last week, I thought I would go for broke and review the rest of my cycling library.  If the last time you went out on two wheels was longer than you can remember, you might want to look away for a bit.

In the meantime, the rest of us can check out possibly the most remarkable book ever written by a sportsman: It’s Not About the Bike, by Lance Armstrong (affiliate links: UK, US).

It really isn’t about the bike

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Of course it’s about the bike

No, really, it’s not about the bike.  It’s about Armstrong’s unbelievable will to beat every adversary, even severe illness.  Bear in mind that the book just covers Armstrong’s battle with cancer and his first Tour de France.  It doesn’t even get as far as his record-setting seven Tour wins…

This would have been an awesome book even without the coverage of Armstrong winning his first tour just 18 months after being diagnosed with cancer.  As it stands, it is much better than that.

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OK, I’ve been living under a rock for twenty years, what’s it about?

Well, my troglodyte friend, let me tell you.

In the early 1990′s, Lance Armstrong was an up-and-coming road racing cyclist who had been a youthful prodigy, being the youngest rider ever to win the UCI Road World Championship.  It wasn’t clear whether he was going to mature well and become a world-class cyclist or whether he was going to burn out and disappear like so many others.  In the mid-1990′s, it seemed that he stood at a cross-roads.  Mature and succeed, or fizzle out and retire.

However, he did neither, because in October 1996, he was diagnosed with testicular cancer, which spread to his lungs and his brain.  He suffered extensive surgery and chemotherapy and lost all of his strength and fitness.  It seemed that his cycling days were over.

But Armstrong was made of sterner stuff, possibly the sternest stuff, because he did not back down from the challenge for a moment.  He fought it every step of the way and came out the other side, still persisting.

And when he came out the other side, he decided to get back on his bike.  He saddled up and started training.  He was so weak that his friends took turns to ride with him, keeping an eye on him and cycling so slowly that they nearly fell asleep.  He didn’t notice how slow they were going until an old lady passed them easily on a shopper, going to fetch her groceries.  Then he noticed, but he didn’t give up.

As his fitness returned, he decided to compete again.  Kudos, people said.  Well done, for getting back on the bike.  No-one expected him to perform as well as he had done in the past.  As he grew stronger, people noted his improving performance.  He would become part of cycling’s history, they thought, an interesting footnote.

In time, cycling aficionados would ask each other “did you know that an unknown cyclist called Lance Armstrong rode the Tour de France even after a battle with cancer?” and other, less well-read fans would remark in amazement.

But Armstrong wasn’t interested in living up to anyone else’s standards.  He wasn’t interested in being a footnote, cancer or no cancer.  He wanted to be the best at what he did, and that happened to be cycle racing.  And his will to win was so gigantic that it consumed his life until he became the greatest endurance cyclist of his generation and won the Tour de France.

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A consuming will to win, very poetic

Well, forgive me, but cyclists revere one of their greatest heroes, Eddy Merckx, by calling him “the Cannibal.”  Eddy would eat his opponents alive, they said.  He never failed to take an opportunity to attack, and he never backed down until his competitors had been well and truly defeated.

A few years after It’s Not About the Bike finishes, Armstrong’s will to win had gone beyond consuming his own life and, like Eddy before him, had begun consuming his opponents too.  Armstrong was practically uncontested during his reign.  His only real opponents were specialists, because all-rounders were incapable of getting near him.  Ulrich was too heavy and focused on time-trialing.  Pantani was brilliant and a great climber but poor on the flat and very brittle.

Armstrong went further than Eddy.  He didn’t just dominate his opponents, he realigned the public’s perceptions of the sport.  A few Tour wins later, as the press got wind of his remarkable story, he consumed the Tour de France and its mythology.  The race was watched because Armstrong was in it, rather than the other way around.  Here was legend in the making.  Nothing better than this had ever gone before.

At the end, people were becoming interested in cycle racing because of Armstrong and he became a great, no the great, ambassador for the sport, irrespective of what the French may think…

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So if I haven’t read this book, I should get it?

If you haven’t read this book, you should chastise yourself roundly for failing to take in one the most remarkable stories of our time.  Then you should go a buy a brand new copy, for penance.