Butcher, Blacksmith, Acrobat, Sweep

First drawn into the sport while a student in Spain in the mid-1980s, Peter Cossins has been writing about cycling since 1993, contributing principally to Cycling Weekly, Cycle Sport and Procycling. The Monuments, his history of cycling's five greatest one-day Classic races, was published in 2014, followed in 2015 by Alpe d’Huez, an appraisal of cycling’s greatest climb.For Yellow Jersey Press he has written the definitive account of the first ever Tour de France, Butcher, Blacksmith, Acrobat, Sweep the also the enlightening book on cycling tactics, Full Gas.He lives in the Ariège in the heart of the French Pyrenees.

Essential…The First Tour de France takes you back to the race itself. Cossins produces a deeply researched and detailed description of the race that toggles between background information on the race’s organization and the individual stages, with long stretches of real-time-style stage reporting one chapter at a time.The effect of this, especially the latter, is soaring