Tim Krabbé
The Rider
Meyrueis, Lozere, June 26, 1977. Hot and overcast. I take my gear out of the car and put my bike together. Tourists and locals are watching from sidewalk cafes. Non-racers. The emptiness of those lives shocks me.
Possibly the best opening lines to a book in capturing the essence of the read as much as that other epic opening of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. The book is a brilliantly evocative description of a mountainous road race with breaks to describe the writer's cycle race history and snippets about other professionals. It's written with such passion and skill that you can feel the highs and lows and pain suffered in bike racing. One passage is of Tim racing with famous riders in surreal circumstances (lending Mercx a fork to each fried mashed potato is verging on the trippy and are obviously dreams. A great book worth a read whether a cyclist or not.
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