Full Gas by Peter Cossins review – tactics and the Tour de France
21 July 2018 06:30
A cycling journalist turns his gaze on the puzzles of the peloton, and falls back in love with the sportThe Tour de France, which finishes in Paris next weekend, attracts more than 10 million spectators to line its near 3,500km route, uniquely comprehensive press coverage for the sport and a TV and online audience estimated to be in the billions. Yet only a tiny fraction of those watching will have the first clue as to what is actually going on.Yes, there are obviously winners of the 21 stages, and an overall champion is crowned when they reach the Champs-Élysées. But in a peloton of 180 riders, operating in a seemingly chaotic working environment best described as like being inside a washing machine, very few are attempting to win. The vast majority are implementing a dizzyingly fluid set of agendas and allegiances that can combine – often in the same rider in the same race – team and personal ambitions, altruism and blatant commercialism, high courage and low cunning. In what is quite a brave admission for a cycling journalist, Peter Cossins admits early on in this breezy, enlightening book that even for someone who has reported on the sport for quarter of a century, what actually happens between flag and finish can often be close to “incomprehensible”.Cossins traces an ?arc to today’s stars, whose husbanding of energy produces three-week races won by only seconds Continue readingread full article
