I was on holiday on the beach last week, so I didn't get a chance to all new content on the blog. I got a chance to finish a good book to read while I was lounging on the sand al-Come and Gone: A True Story of blue-collar Bike Racing in America by Joe Parkin. Come and Gone is the sequel to a dog in a hat, Parkin of previous book about his five year racing as a IL in Europe.
The new book picks in 1991, the year that Parkin returned to the u.s. after his contract with the Belgium based Tulip Computers team. I really enjoyed his stories of domestic racing in the 1990s, partly because I have so many fond memories of racing during that time. I was definitely not a pro, but the Parkin stories about some of the road and mountain bike races that I remember fondly surely transported me back in time.
Joe Parkin was not the fastest or most famous pro cyclist of his time, but his passion for bicycle racing is what encounters in this book. His fight to live like a pro racer season after season (both on-road and dirty) kept me interested and made sure the book hard to drop. The conversation, almost rambling style in which he tells stories which makes it sometimes have the feeling that he tell them just for you.
If he of the ups and downs of the second half of the career of the pro race tells, give a feeling of excitement, as well as the disappointment and frustration, which goes hand in hand with struggling to follow a real passion. Come and Gone is an honest and authentic account of the not always glamorous life of an average pro bike racer, and I think that is what sets it apart from many of the other cycling books I've read.
The story is not build an important turning point or career pinnacle that is already known. instead, it offers a real, and sometimes unflattering, glimpse into a lifestyle that many cycling fans and amateur racers a bit curious about.
The book provides a nice colour photo section in the middle that I enjoyed almost as much as the stories (Nothing transports me back to the late 1980s and early 1990s more than garish team kits, lugged steel frames and Euro racing mullets).As I read the chapters on different seasons, teams and matches, I found myself flipping to the photo section to look at the accompanying photos.
These days, in addition to writing books and blogging at 6 years in a rain Cape, is Joe Parkin the editor of Bike magazine. cycling is the only mountain bike oriented magazine that I subscribe (for now at least), so I'm very excited about the new sister am publication, paved. I haven't seen the first issue yet, but as paved the same great photography and occasional offbeat attitude as Bike has, I'm sure it will be one of my new favorite bike magazines.
Posted in Review. Tagged with book review, mountain biking, pro Cycling, road racing. By James T
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