Book description
For Jeremy Whittle, there isn't much in life as spectacular as the
Tour de France: sweat-streaked, taut and burnished athletes toiling
across vast and ancient European landscapes, hundreds of thousands of
fans lining the route. The twisting Mediterranean roads, the jerseys,
the peloton in full flight - these have become as familiar to him as
the lines around his eyes. And then there are the riders: men of
almost superhuman capabilities, men who have become his friends, men
whose stories he has written day in day out for the past decade. But
even the biggest fan can one day wake up to find that he has lost his faith.
We all want to believe in our heroes. That's why Jeremy got into
cycling. But what happens when you can't? When you've seen too many
positive dope tests, when you've been lied to too many times, when
your sport is destroying itself from within?
Bad Blood is the story of Jeremy Whittle's journey from
unquestioning fan to Tour de France insider and confirmed sceptic.
It's about broken friendships and a sport divided; about having to
choose sides in the war against doping; about how galloping greed and
corporate opportunism have led the Tour de France to the brink of
destruction. Part personal memoir, part devastating exposé of a sport
torn apart by drugs and scandal, Bad Blood is a love letter to
one man's past, and a warning to cycling's future.
Jeremy Whittle has been covering professional cycling since 1993. A
former editor of
procycling
magazine and the
Official Guide to the Tour de France
, he covers cycling for
The Times
and the
Sunday Herald
. He has appeared on BBC Radio 4, Radio 5, NPR and CNN and is the author
of
Yellow Fever
(1998) and
Le Tour
(2003).
