Losing And Dying: It's The Same Thing.

Cycling Is So Hard, The Suffering Is So Intense, That It’s Absolutely Cleansing. The Pain Is So Deep And Strong That A Curtain Descends Over Your Brain….once; Someone Asked Me What Pleasure I Took In Riding For So Long. ‘pleasure???? I Said.’ ‘i Don’t Understand The Question.’ I Didn’t Do It For The Pleasure; I Did It For The Pain.

Your Past Forms You, Whether You Like It Or Not. Each Encounter And Experience Has Its Own Effect, And You're Shaped The Way The Wind Shapes A Mesquite Tree On A Plain.

Cancer Taught Me A Plan For More Purposeful Living, And That In Turn Taught Me How To Train And To Win More Purposefully. It Taught Me That Pain Has A Reason, And That Sometimes The Experience Of Losing Things-whether Health Or A Car Or An Old Sense Of Self-has Its Own Value In The Scheme Of Life. Pain And Loss Are Great Enhancers.

The Tour (de France) Is Essentially A Math Problem, A 2,000-mile Race Over Three Weeks That's Sometimes Won By A Margin Of A Minute Or Less. How Do You Propel Yourself Through Space On A Bicycle, Sometimes Steeply Uphill, At A Speed Sustainable For Three Weeks? Every Second Counts.

There Were No Shortcuts, I Realized. It Took Years Of Racing To Build Up The Mind And Body And Character Until A Rider Had Logged Hundreds Of Races And Thousands Of Miles Of Road. I Wouldn't Be Able To Win A Tour De France Until I Had Enough Iron In My Legs, And Lungs, And Brain And Heart.