The Secret Race: Inside the Hidden World of the Tour de France Paperback – May 7, 2013

This is the most devastating chronicle yet of the recent history of pro bike racing, for several reasons:

- First, the co-author, Daniel Coyle, knows his way around pro bike racing. He wrote Lance Armstrong's War: One Man's Battle Against Fate, Fame, Love, Death, Scandal, and a Few Other Rivals on the Road to the Tour de France, and his experience shows. More than just a story about Hamilton, "The Secret Race" weaves in all the significant doping scandals of the past 15 years. Although the publicity surrounding this book is driven by the interest in Lance Armstrong, the book exposes a sport-wide culture where doping was expected and the infrastructure to support it was easily accessible to the best riders.

- Second, the level of prosaic detail adds credibility. It's more than just a chronicle of what drugs were taken -- but also detail on how they worked; how they were concealed; how tests were beaten; the logistics of getting to and from the doping doctors; and the strategy of timing blood doping sessions to correspond with key stages of big races. Hamilton even details the bonus schedule he paid to his doping doctors for each major victory. Although I've read previous books on the topic, I was still surprised by the intensity of doping activities outlined here. It's the difference between having the story told by "outsiders" (investigators, journalists, team assistants) vs. "insiders" (someone like Hamilton who is finally willing to tell the story).

- Third, Hamilton's own personal story is believable. He helps explain why bike racers decide to dope, why lying about it becomes so central to their day to day lives, and what it takes to turn the corner and start telling the truth. The co-author's key challenge in this book is to make the reader accept the story of someone who lied for so long, and inevitably we have to wonder, "He lied then, is he telling the truth now?" The context provided here allows the reader to make that leap.

Two other individuals are worth mentioning. The first is David Walsh, the London Times journalist who wrote, From Lance to Landis: Inside the American Doping Controversy at the Tour de France, which outlined way back in 2007 what was happening inside pro racing during the "Lance Armstrong era." None of the recent doping scandals has been a real surprise to anyone who read Walsh's book. "The Secret Race" has a lot more detail, since it's told by a true insider, but without David Walsh, Paul Kimmage and a few others continuing to tell this story the facts likely would have never come out (One thing that's clear from "The Secret Race" is that the sport's governing body, the UCI, was never going to blow the whistle on itself).
[Nov. 2012 update: David Walsh's stories that laid out the original allegations against Lance Armstrong have just been released in a Kindle edition, Lanced: The shaming of Lance Armstrong, and coming soon is his new e-book, Seven Deadly Sins ]

The second person to mention is Andy Hampsten, another American cycling hero whose 1988 ride in the Tour of Italy is still legendary. Hampsten was competing at the top level of international cycling before the EPO era but then found himself out-muscled by back-of-the-pack competitors who suddenly transformed themselves, turbocharged by EPO and blood transfusions. For anyone who thinks that it's OK to excuse continuing coverups because "it was a level playing field; they all doped," it's worth reading Andy Hampsten's quotes:

"In the mid eighties, when I came up, riders were doping but it was still possible to compete with them...bottom line, a clean rider could compete in the big three-week races. EPO changed everything...all of a sudden whole teams were ragingly fast, all of a sudden I was struggling to make time limits. By 1994, I'd be on climbs, working as hard as I've ever worked, producing exactly the same power, at the same weight, and right alongside me would be these big-assed guys, and they'd be chatting like were were on the flats! It was completely crazy. As the 1996 season went by...everybody knew what was up, everybody was talking about EPO, everybody could see the writing on the wall."

Hampsten retired from pro bike racing at that time. Other racers made a different decision, and signed up for in-depth doping regimes; their story is told here. To believe that anyone raced clean and then won the Tour de France 7 times in a row at the height of the doping era seems to defy reality. To use a term repeated often in "The Secret Race," it would have to be "extraterrestrial."

Normally I don't write these reviews, but this was such a compelling read in light of the events that have been unfolding. Tyler Hamilton, who I admired for his ability to push through pain. Tyler Hamilton, who I lost every ounce of respect for after he lied about doping and then admitted to it. Tyler Hamilton, who I started to see not as an athlete who cheated, but as a human being who I eventually began to understand and sympathize, and a newfound sympathy for his plight and struggle. Here is a man who I no longer see as a "bad person", but someone who came to a series of life changing decisions and forks in the path, and were I to be put in his shoes, I would probably have done exactly the same things. Looking back at the many years of cycling, I realized I blindly refused to believe that the greatest hero in sports would ever guilty of a crime, and that the world was simply trying to bring him down for his successes, and I, like many others, grouped the LeMonde, Le Mondes, Ballasters, and the Andreaus as bitter people trying to destroy a great champion. This book reveals so much detail to a point where you kick yourself for being so oblivious and ignorant of the existence of such a massive, organized underworld. This book will be a game changer.

Fabulous book. I read it in just over one day. Smooth and easy read with a ton of information and an abundance of inspiration.

Tyler Hamilton was a professional cyclist, who rode side by side with Lance Armstrong until he became Armstrong's opponent (I'll let you guess why that happened). This book is full of incredible truths about Hamilton's doping and his struggles with the shame and dishonesty it came with. In most of the book Tyler points the finger at his own mistakes and wrong doings, which was both frustrating and touching. Yes, there is plenty of finger pointing at Lance, too, and it's not pretty (it definitely confirmed my feelings about Armstrong's character). One might think Tyler is calling out Armstrong in a vindictive way, but that's not the case at all, (plus there are so many testimonials from other riders that confirm Tyler's claims).

This book has guts and fire, it's real and deeply honest. I learned a lot about the science of doping and, while I don't agree with it at all, I now understand the why of it all. The truth is sad, indeed. I look at all sports differently now, that's for certain.

I admire Tyler for his honesty, which came at a huge cost. HUGE! But the inspiration this book holds, the insight to honesty and how it literally does set you free, is remarkable. It's easy to tell the truth when you don't have much to lose, but it's much harder to tell the truth when you have everything to lose. In the end it may have cost Tyler his career and an Olympic gold medal, but it gave him the important things that hold greater value. Very few books bring me to tears, but this one did, many times.

There are many wonderful quotes in the book that stayed with me but this one stands out...."I know that old saying that when God closes a door He opens a window. I think that saying is really talking about the resilience of truth. I’ve come to learn that truth is a living thing. It has a force inside it, an inner springiness. The truth can’t be denied or locked away, because when that happens, the pressure builds. When a door gets closed, the truth seeks a window, and blows the glass clean out. "

I highly recommend this book.....it will open your eyes to the truth about athletes who dope and why. But most of all, it will touch your heart.