Ten Points

by Bill Strickland

Of the eight million dedicated cyclists in this country, just 32,044 own amateur racing licenses. There's a reason for Racing is not only incredibly difficult, it's downright excruciating, with the possibility for public humiliation never more than one pedal away. So when Natalie, Bill Strickland's preschool-aged daughter, asked him if he could win ten points during one racing season -- the bicycling equivalent of taking an at-bat against Randy Johnson or going one-on-one with Lebron James -- a sensible man wouldve just said no and moved on. Instead, Strickland decided to try. In the process, he discovered that he was racing toward the loving home life he cherished and, at the same time, trying to get away from something far worse -- his legacy of horrific childhood abuse. Strickland's memoir is filled with lyrical insights on training and dedication, racing scenes packed with nail-biting suspense, and powerful reflections on the meaning of family. Because for Strickland, it's definitely not about the bike.

Genres: Cycling, Biography, Nonfiction, Audiobook, Sports, Adventure, Biography Memoir

256 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2007

Reviews

[Travis · Rating 4 out of 5]

My lovely girlfriend lent me this book over winter and told me I would really enjoy it. At first look I was intrigued by the fact that it was a cycling memoir by a guy a faintly knew from flipping through Bicycling magazine and I plopped it onto my to-be-read stack of books. I remember expressing to my girlfriend a few times that I was waiting to read the book in spring as a motivational tool for starting up my summer as a very novice cyclist. And each time I would talk about the book my girlfriend would remind me that it wasn't just a book about cycling that it also was about his personal struggle with his childhood.
I came for the cycling and stayed for his struggle. Strickland writes about the emotion, speed, feel, and environment of cycling with a great love, respect and knowledge of the sport. He writes as detailed as a sports announcer broadcasting the big game but as poetic as great love poem. But what was really profound to me was the struggles I could identify with. There are pieces in this book I completely identified with, although I could never imagine going through what he went through, the fears he has as an adult are the same that I have. This was a enjoyable read on the level of a family, cycling and wonderful tail as well as a great therapeutic release.

[pea. · Rating 5 out of 5]

WOW.... why this was not recommended by Oprah i will never know... why this is not a movie... and really why only less than 60 people on Goodreads have marked this on any of their lists is just a travesty of great proportions!
READ THIS BOOK
it is a fast, gripping heart wrenching read... and you may even pick up a few cycling terms that go beyond Lance Armstrong.

[Timojhen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Got me to tears on an airplane, so that's something. I knew (of) the author from his work at Bicycling magazine, which I respected a lot.

This isn't really about bicycling, though it does play a part. As a parent and (once) a child, I think Bill's honesty and growing self awareness will leave the lasting impression.

I too understand breaking the cycle. Maybe that's the tears.

[Jay French · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tells the story of trying to score 10 points in a season of weekly bike races, intermixed with graphic flashbacks of child abuse. I was expecting the details of bike racing, and those were well done. I was not expecting the abuse, and it didn't help the story along in my opinion. I listened to this on audio. The male narrator voiced the 5 year old daughter in a "baby talk" voice which was quite annoying throughout.

[Zygmunt]

As someone who consistently fails at everything, tales of failure are greatly appreciated, but this book failed to deliver a satisfying failure due to the deterministic nature of bicycle racing.

[Connie Curtis · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was hard to listen to. The author suffered horrific abuse as a young boy, and he relates the stories in detail that left my mouth agape.

Cycling has helped Bill Strickland handle the demons that have been handed down through his ancestors, horrible abuse suffered generations past. He's trying desperately to break that cycle.

I admire this man for recognizing the horror that needs to stop with him, for trying so hard to handle life differently than his father did. Cycling helps him keep his sanity.

His father was an evil, criminally insane man that I'm glad is no longer on this earth so he can't get to Bill's daughter.

Coming from such a dysfunctional childhood, Bill immersed himself in the world of racing cyclists. It was an interesting look into the world of elite athletes and his struggle to break the cycle of abuse.

This book is not for children. It is not a book that will leave you feeling good, but you will never forget it.

[Lisa Stefanelli · Rating 4 out of 5]

I get the cycling aspect of the book, being a bike racer myself and also participating in Thursday night training criteriums, as well as having raced a crit where the story took place, as well as many Cx races. This book was written in 2007 and it was a surprise to personally know some of the racers in the criterium in the book who are still active in the community today, as well as the scorer. Cycling to be competitive takes up many hours of time and requires extreme dedication so most cyclists have some issues they are riding from and /or replacing. I loved the bike race recounts but it was a tough read regarding the abuse.

[Eric · Rating 4 out of 5]

Difficult book! Very graphic - maybe too much - though being a memoir, reflects a life history which is visceral.

Given this, Bill's story is humbling and uplifting, even if gag-inducing. I would recommend reading the paperback version so you can skip the distasteful parts, though having done the audio version, I didn't easily have this options.

SO, that's out of the way. What a great story, wonderfully weaving the authors childhood and experiences with his relationship with his daughter and criterion bicycle racing.

Would have been 5-star, except for the gag-factor. :-(

[ClaudiaTBMackey · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a former road cyclist (never an elite racer), child abuse survivor, and aspiring author, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Strickland eloquently portrays the thrill of cycling, the desperation of attempting to prove one's self, the anguish and mystery of an abusive parent, and a father's love for his daughter. Strickland portrays himself as a faulty man and I found his honesty refreshing. If you are a cyclist, you definitely want to read this book -- but be prepared for the darkness that is entwined with love of the road.

[Carl · Rating 2 out of 5]

There were two stories in this book: The challenge of getting points during weekly cycling criteriums; recalling an abusive childhood. The cycling challenge was a subpar narrative for me. Yes, the author captured the soul draining experience that hardcore cycling can produce. However, the description of the experience wasn't that interesting - and I'm a cyclist! His childhood narrative was much more interesting. The abuse caused by his father was bizarre and shameful.

What did I learn: The human spirit is indestructible.

[Shawn Wang · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great story about love. The love of cycling lead to a true racer. The love of his daughter kept him trying to earn ten points in a season. The love of his wife forgave his betrayal in his marriage. From the start, he was born to an abusive father who once put a gun in his mouth.

[Margaret · Rating 4 out of 5]

A brave book. There were parts that were very difficult to read, but overall it was heart-warming. It was also interesting, as I was not familiar with professional cycling.

[Judy Eaton · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one book you won't forget. I just finished it, and am still digesting. Read this book!!!

[Mark Trimmer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great autobiography

[Tim Wester · Rating 1 out of 5]

Not too interesting

[Carl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thought this was a book about crit racing. I was very wrong. There’s plenty of racing in it, mind you, but it’s waaaay deeper and darker than I was expecting it to be.

[Chip · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting story and the time jumps were seamless but I just felt it was missing something. Narrator was tough to like at certain points.

[Kirk Albers · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful.

[Michael Travis · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are not many books can you use the words chilling and exhilarating in the same review. A little background on how I came to read this book. Bill and I were close neighbors, one block apart in NW Indiana, and good friends during our teenage years (late 70’s/early 80’s). Throughout the last 30 years or so I have always often wondered what happened to Bill after he left the area and went to college in southern Indiana. Back in those days there wasn’t much e-mail or Facebook to follow each other and staying in touch was expensive without cheap cell plans or reasonable long distance.

Fast forward to 2016 and a class reunion in our home town of Lake Station. There are always those that you wonder where they went and Bill was definitely one of those classmates. Every time I would do a Google search I would come up with a Bill Strickland philanthropist with hundreds of pages of videos and articles. It was like Bill had vanished off the face of the earth or my search skills were awfully weak.

Anyway I mentioned Bill’s name at our class reunion and a girl we knew said, “Bill is an editor of a large biking magazine and has written a book called Ten Points.” She continued, “he wrote about had bad he was abused as a child and tied in into bike riding and his child.”

Upon returning to Utah from the reunion I had to look up this book and finally find my friend. I ordered the book for my Kindle app with my Amazon Prime account and tore right into it. I could have never imagined he was abused as a child (I figured his dad was rough on him but the rest I guess I was either shielded from or just adolescent ignorance while drinking at a young age and stuff).

I have always enjoyed a bike ride but not be passionate about it. My wife and I witnessed the end of the Tour De France in 2011 while in Paris and I have watched various events on the sports channels. Ten Points is a cycling book as much as a lesson in life. Strickland’s use of cycling as a method of overcoming horrible childhood events, while becoming an amazing father, makes this an amazing read. I have to admit I usually not much on these type of books but the personal connection to Bill made this a book I wanted to read in one night.

I don’t won’t to give away too much of the story but if you are a cycling person this book is for you and if you are a person that has had personal struggles this is also a book for you. And by the way if you are a person that enjoys well written books this is also a book for you. Ten Points scores a 10 with me!

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

Alternating between the story of a grueling season of bike racing, memories of horrific childhood abuse, and daily experience as a father and husband, this extraordinary memoir invites the reader deep into the writer's psyche. Strickland is a talented and courageous writer; there are dozens of lyrical passages in which the sensory experience of cycling exposes the suffering of the rider, yet this suffering pales next to that inflicted by the writer's father. Strickland's muse is his five year old daughter, Natalie; his interlocutor is his wife, Beth. Despite Strickland's manful effort to keep his past bottled up, he sees himself begin to repeat the patterns of abuse he suffered. This terrifies him, yet unleashing the beast within is the only way to win the bike race. How Strickland comes to understand this conflict carries the memoir. Cyclists and non-cyclists alike should enjoy the dramatic descriptions of bike racing and the characters that populate them, yet this reading demands a deeper commitment. The detailed account of several episodes of abuse are very difficult to read; the reporting of unconscious attempts to sabotage his own family are perhaps even more painful. It takes courage to race bikes, but it ultimately takes even more simply to love his wife and daughter and abandon the multi-generational cycle of abuse that had been the legacy of Strickland men. Bravo to a passionate story, very well told.

[Josh · Rating 4 out of 5]

A powerful, at times difficult, memoir of the author's struggle to reckon with his childhood, and his own potential as a father, juxtaposed with the lessons he learned during a season of bicycle racing.

[Gil Bradshaw · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was really heavy and at the same time gave great life stories. I thought it was awesome how Bill came as far as he did from the life he grew up with.

Be warned that there is graphic emotional, sexual, and physical abuse that is openly discussed in this book. Strickland talks about overcoming it on his bicycle.

Funny, but the premise of the book is he is trying to get ten points in a crit series (if you don't know what a crit is then it explains it in the book, but it might not be that interesting). The silly part is that it is a promise to his 5 year old daughter. I had a hard time getting that part of the book.

However, the overall content and writing and story is awesome. It just so happens that the premise is really corny.


Also, Strickland lays himself emotionally out there in ways that I have never seen anyone lay themselves out there. It must have been a cathartic experience because it was really beneficial to those who read it.

And I read it because I wanted to read about bike racing. There was plenty racing and bike stuff in there. It fulfilled my expectation in that way.

[Val · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although marketed as a cycling story, Bill Strickland's autobiographical snippet is so much more than that. The psychology of this book goes beyond racing and training technique and ventures into the world of old childhood fears teamed with adulthood guilt.
Strickland tells harrowing tales of his abuse incurred by his father and relates these to his trials as a more peaceful and respectable father to his own daughter. These lessons in patience and inner strength transpose nicely onto the racing field, although he doesn't always get his way.
Ten points go from being a daughter's naive wish to a father's yearning hope.
I enjoyed this book so much more than I was expecting because it is not solely about cycling. As a cyclist who enjoys bike-centric stories, this was a refreshing take on the sport. Due to my own experiences, I found it easy to relate to the constant turmoil Strickland continues to feel, inflected from both the memories of his father and the game of racing.
This is ultimately a tale of fatherhood, childhood, passions, rage, despair, and acceptance. And bicycles. Please don't forget the bicycles.

[Michael · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'm generally interested in books about different sorts of bicycling experiences and there certainly are many different sorts - both of such experiences and the books about them.

Nominally this is about Strickland trying to win a certain number of points as a criterium racer despite not being a natural for this sort of racing. (Criterium races are typically on a short urban course, doing laps, and at a very high rate of speed.) The descriptions of the race are pretty good and certainly make it all seem dramatic.

The book tries to connect Strickland's success (or lack thereof) as a racer to his being a father to his five year old daughter and flashes back to how he was raised by his own father. Some of what he was trying to say with this apparently went over my head and in describing his relationship with his father, he seems determined to have you understand in the greatest possible horrific detail just how awful it was - beyond all reason. He also says some damn peculiar things about his own marriage. Ugh. I just paged through the last half and read the bits about racing. Ideally someone would tear out all the pages about anything other than racing.

[Corrina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Was given this book as a gift from a good friend who knows I love biking and memoirs. I can't believe what a fast and smooth read this book is, and I am still reeling from some of it. The stories of his childhood abuse hit you like sucker punches - like huge boulders when you are speeding downhill on a mountain bike. They leave you breathless and almost unbelieving. I would give this book 3 stars instead of 4, just because of how intensely and unpleasantly these things hit you. But I loved that his life was an eternal quest to leave that abuse behind, and I understand the insane amount of fear you have when you have been abused that you will turn into your abuser when you have a child, and there is a need to find some kind of peace with that fear to really be free in a relationship and especially as a parent. I understand the insane drive to succeed somehow in spite of yourself - because you carry that shame around and it does weigh you down, and it does hit you like a sucker punch sometimes.

[Kathy · Rating 5 out of 5]

OMG! I loved this book. I read it in 2-3 days. It's a memoir by Bill Strickland, Executive Editor of Bicycling Magazine. He shares his dream of earning 10 points throughout the summer at the local Thursday night crit series. The catch - his crit series is full of pro or practically pro cyclists due to his proximity to the velodrome just outside of Philadelphia. Many world-class cyclists spend time there to train and, therefore, race in the Thursday night crits. As an aside, his crit race is 30 FREAKIN' MILES!! Wha Wha!? I cannot imagine the suffering.

The suffering he experiences racing, however, does not come close to the suffering he experienced as an abused child, which he describes in abhorrent detail. Much of the abuse, I could only skim over. It was that disgusting!

He is now a husband and father with multiple demons. This book details his quest to exorcise his demons through crit racing and earning the elusive -- Ten Points.

[Jtomassetti · Rating 2 out of 5]

TEN POINTS was written by Bill Strickland an editor of Bicycling magazine. In the world of Bicycling Magazine everything is encouraging and happy. I expected this book to be the same.

Instead it seems to be a book written as therapy for the author who gives horrifying details of the unimaginable child abuse he experienced from his father as a child. I hope I never meet anyone as evil as his father.

The story line involving Strickland's attempts to win 10 point in a series of local summer races to fulfill a promise to his daughter are well written and interesting but not good enough to counterbalance the horrible flash backs to his childhood that suddenly pop up during the race scenes.

Had I known what this book contained before I bought it, I would not have bothered to read it. I usually keep all of my bicycling books but not this one. Only read this book if you like psychological horror stories.

[William Kimeria · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a terrific, and at times, harrowing bike. I love Bill Strickland's regular column in Bicycling magazine, and this book is on the surface about his quest to win 10 sprint points within one season in the competitive Thursday Night Crits.

If you like bikes and bike racing, you will love this. If you've ever raced road bikes, you will identify with him.

But the book is really so much more than just about bike racing, it is about life, how we deal with our demons, how people deal with being dealt horrible hands by life, and ultimately it is about triumph.

It is a quick read, it took me an evening to finish.

[Richard Hunt · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ten Points is a difficult book, both in subject matter and in admitting that it didn't win me over. The author nail the action scenes, but I just couldn't make myself feel the Great-Santini-like parental abuse sections. While they were obviously wrenching and hurtful, it felt contrived to keep using them as the motive decades later. When you learn it was as much a memoir as it was fiction, your heart goes out to the author for having suffered whatever, if not all, the duress and pain, but overall, it didn't come together to ring one long, clear note...at least for me.

[Theresa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Recently took up road cycling, it is getting cooler out, also after putting on a130 km ride and 3,000 km ,s on my new giant defy, I was struck while riding from behind, despite having red flashing USB light and an orange jersey!

So I am recovering, whiplash, and knee damage,

But this book took me away , I really found it to keep my attention, and tugged at my heart, hurting for the author.


And off I go, a bit more knowledge, and bravery, which I will need , I turn 60 soon and am cycling grandma!

Wonderful book, thanks