A Significant Other

Author:

By Matt Rendell

Format:

Paperback (Hardback)

Availability:

In print, usually dispatched within 48 hours.

Price:

£7.99 £7.19 (Save 10%)

Tagged with:

Cycling, Tour de France, Lance Armstrong, US Postal

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Further Details

• Published: 5th May 2005
• ISBN: 0753818744
• Pages: 192
• Size: 198mm x 129mm

From the Publisher:

Lance Armstrong's place in the cycling history books is assured. Winner of the Tour de France a record-breaking six times, he is regarded as one of the greatest individual talents the sport has ever seen. Perhaps his most compelling victory was in 2003 when he won the coveted Centenary race. However, without the team of brilliant athletes assembled to support him - the domestiques - victory in the Tour would have been impossible.

Not only do these superbly trained athletes ride alongside the team leader, supplying water and equipment, but they also create a moving stream of energy that is vital for competitive success. In 2003, Lance Armstrong's domestique, Victor Hugo Pena, actually took over the yellow jersey and stepped into history. A Significant Other is the story of that race but also of these unsung heros of the sport.

From the Critics:

“Rendell elegantly elucidates the tactical technicalities of cycling's unique mixture of cooperation and competition, teamwork and individualism...The beauty of Rendell's brief book is that he has secured the cooperation of a real-life domestique, the Colombian Victor Hugo Pena, who was a key member of Lance Armstrong's US Postal squad on his way to a record-equalling fifth Tour won last year”

Matt Seaton, The Guardian

“There is a scholarly quality to A SIGNIFICANT OTHER, a short but powerful book that uses the diary of a domestique in the 2003 Tour de France as the counterpoint to the author's exploration of the true nature of top-class competitive cycling...you won't find a better analysis of the extraordinary collective feat that is a team of cyclists working together at speed”

Sean O'Hagan, Independent on Sunday

“Rendell's explanations of the technicalities of cycling formations combine admirably with the chapters in Pena's voice, when we see these moves put into practice. The result is a rare sports book that actually gives an idea of the experience of being a professional athlete”

David Horspool, Times Literary Supplement