The secret race by Tyler Hamilton and Daniel Coyle

About a week ago I got a comment from a visitor that I should read The secret race by Tyler Hamilton, I am sorry that I hadn't reply to him/her comment but I was reading just that. Please excuse me for not replying so this review goes to you, my Anonymous commenter. I am glad that someone mentioned this book because after Lance Armstrong's, I was considering him a hero with or without the doping charges. Now I tend to veer my opinion towards a neutral stance. 

What's the deal with this book, you may ask. Yes, it is controversial. ...And yes, it gives you insight on the world of bike racers and doping. This is another cyclist's biography on the Tour de France events and how everybody did what they did. I believe that there are some major lessons to be learned from this book, especially if you like bikes and cycling. One of them is that winning a bike race means lots of work, determination, lots of pain and extremely low body fat. I am screwed on the last one though, I guess I don't have what it takes to be a pro racer. (Now pass me another beer). 

I have noticed a pattern here about the racing world: each sportsman was running from something: Armstrong started his career because he had a difficult family life, Hamilton was battling depression and he needed an outlet etc. etc. But then they went to professional races and their objectives changed. In a way I think that all that doping was a way to gain leverage in a world where it was common practice. This is what Hamilton is trying to say in his book: you gained a few seconds (maybe even minutes) through doping, but there is no denying the fact that behind their results was a lot of hard work.

I really liked this one. In a way, I liked it more than Armstrong's because it gave me another point of view of the guy. He was determined to win, at all costs. That made him a bully and an asshole, but I don't consider him a cheater. He did things better than the rest and beat them at their own game.  What, I think, sucked was how he defended his title and his attitude towards his friends and colleagues. Read the book if you want to know more about the whole scandal. It might not be objective, but no autobiography ever is.

It's not about the bike: My journey back to life by Lance Armstrong

It's not about the bike: My journey back to life is one of those books that you have to read while forgetting certain aspects of real life. I had to either be on Lance Armstrong side or consider him a phony and simply dismiss the book. Since I am crazy about bikes, I still think Lance is really awesome (with or without the EPO).

As the title says: it's not about the bike, well... it kind of is, but the author tries to explain his fight with testicular cancer and his wife's process of having a baby in vitro. If you manage to differentiate the entire controversy of doping, you'll find this book as a serious lecture from a man who managed to survive one of the most horrifying diseases of our modern lives.

Before arguing that he had the money to pay for his medical interventions, you should know that he begged his sponsors to cover part of his insurance and he had sold his car and other valuables in order to pay for his treatment. Yes, he had the money and the luck, but he also mentions that when he was down nobody wanted to support him ( as in certain sponsors).

It's a book about family; be it the actual blood family, the family from work or the family you try to make. I had seen another face of the biker. He might be a champion, or a cheater, but in the end he's just another man who is trying to survive in this world. This book just shows that life can be cut short and we still have to fight through all the crap in order to survive.