End Of Road

by Alasdair Fotheringham

The Tour de France is always one of the sporting calendar's most spectacular and dramatic events. But the 1998 Tour provided drama like no other. As the opening stages in Ireland unfolded, the Festina team's soigneur Willy Voet was arrested on the French-Belgian border with a car-load of drugs. Raid after police raid followed, with arrest after arrest hammering the Tour. In protest, there were riders' strikes and go-slows, with several squads withdrawing en masse andone expelled. By the time the Tour reached Paris, just 96 of the 189 starters remained. And of those 189 starters, more than a quarter were later reported to have doped. The 1998 'Tour de Farce's' status as one of the most scandal-struck sporting events in history was confirmed.Voet's arrest was just the beginning of sport's biggest mass doping controversy - what became known as the Festina affair. It all but destroyed professional cycling as the credibility of the entire sport was called into question and the cycling family began to split apart. And yet, ironically, the 1998 Tour was also one of the best races in years."The End of the Road" is the first English-language book to provide in-depth analysis and a colourful evocation of the tumultuous events during the 1998 Tour. Alasdair Fotheringham uncovers, step by step, how the world's biggest bike race sank into a nightmarish series of scandals that left the sport on its knees. He explores its long-term consequences - and what, if any, lessons were learned.

Genres: Cycling, Nonfiction, Sports, History

352 pages, Paperback

First published July 12, 2016

About the author

Alasdair Fotheringham is a British foreign affairs and sports journalist, specializing in cycle racing. Based in Spain, Fotheringham works as a freelance journalist and has written articles for The Independent, The Independent On Sunday, The Guardian, The Daily Express, The Sunday Express, Cycling Weekly and Reuters. He has been The Independent's cycling correspondent since 2001, and having covered the Tour de France 17 times, Fotheringham covered the Olympic Games for the first time in 2008.

Reviews

[Joe O'Donnell · Rating 4 out of 5]

In 1998, a car was pulled over at a police checkpoint at the French-Belgian border. This was no routine spot check: the trunk of the car was packed to the gills with Human Growth Hormone, Testosterone, and EPO, the car itself was being driven by a key employee of the leading team in professional cycling, and the ample drug haul was destined for the start of that year’s Tour de France. “The End of the Road” tells the story of that cycling race and the drugs scandal that engulfed it. The 1998 Tour de France would prove to be perhaps the most the tumultuous tour in its history, and the doping scandal – then the biggest in the history of cycling – would come close to destroying the credibility of the sport forever.

Even the most dedicated of sports fans might question the merit of reading a lengthy account of an edition of a Tour de France dating from over two decades ago. But this is a tale expertly told by the veteran British sports journalist Alasdair Fotheringham, who credibly argues that the scandal-plagued 1998 Tour de France marks perhaps a turning point – or certainly a nadir – for the sport of cycling. This was no ordinary cycling grand tour. From commencement in July 1998 to conclusion three weeks later, this was a race punctuated by police raids and drug revelations, disgraced by the expulsion of its most illustrious teams for doping offences, and disrupted by numerous riders’ strikes to such an extent that the race almost disintegrated completely before it reached its final destination in Paris. And amidst all this turmoil, there was quite a compelling bike race to report on as well.

Fotheringham is excellent at demonstrating how cycling found itself in such a moral morass by 1998, where doping (or what cyclists and their entourages euphemistically referred to as “preparation” and “strict medical supervision”) had become as routine as mending a puncture or changing gears on a climb. What’s most damning in “The End of the Road” are the details of how the cycling authorities (in particular, the world governing body, the UCI) were at best asleep at the handlebars when it came to tackling doping, and at worst actively complicit in playing down its seriousness and covering it up.

This is a lengthy and detailed account of the 1998 Tour, so it is possible that the casual reader might find the intricacies of team tactics and drug distribution systems in professional cycling to be a tad dense. But for cycling nerds and students of sporting history, “The End of the Road” is an absorbing read, and a demonstration of how a sport can so completely lose its moral compass that it becomes “a living laboratory for doping”, resulting in a near-fatal collapse in its credibility.

Thankfully, the 1998 Tour de France would not represent an all-time low for professional cycling, as waiting in the wings was a saviour in the form of … Lance Armstrong.

[Kristen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’m thankful for another book that delves into the widespread doping that has been occurring in the professional peloton for decades. It wasn’t just Lance and the pro peloton has been doping since before Lance was even born! The book did drag a bit in the middle and seemed to be a bit tedious at times but overall was a decent overview of the Festina affair and its aftermath.

[Ietrio · Rating 2 out of 5]

I can't wait to read about "the tour that almost wrecked cycling". Meaning one more order of magnitude and today politicians would have to cut baby stroller pathways though the cities as nobody would have used bicycles.

[Peter Pereira · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very well researched with a limited scope (in this case a good thing). The writing sometimes is a bit confusing in that the author expects the reader to know what he is talking about. Outside of cycling aficionados, there are sections of the book that will be hard to follow. . Still, this book did a great job bringing an important moment in cycling to light.

[Shane · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good book for cycling fans. Some of the insights are great but I found that the book dragged on a bit too much for me.

[Stuart B · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very inside baseball...well cycling! A good insight into how, not only drugs, but also corruption was rife through the peloton and the UCI.

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

This tour was well before I became interested in cycling so was only previously known to me as 'doping'. As long as there is at least something approaching an interesting story a tour seems to give enough material to flesh out a book, and Fotheringham did manage to interview a decent number of the supporting cast so that there was original content.

This was told in chronological order on a stage by stage basis, although the non-mountain stages were mostly glossed over, with only the key GC racing featured in depth. Understandably, most of the focus was on the doping investigations and teams falling out with the race organisers. Two key parts were when the riders stopped en masse in different stages, and despite asking key figures directly, it still wasn't clear why strike action would have been appropriate. Fotheringham alludes to it, but it seems it was mostly out of fear that other teams would be next, every witness arguing that of course, the doping should be investigated, just not like this. Given it was the police investigating, I'm not sure why the tour itself was the target of the protest beyond the opportunity to do so.

The author had little time for Richard Virenque but other than that this was a mostly neutral book; few readers will want to hear someone else's opinion on doping but Fotheringham himself only had a cameo role explaining what it was like for beat reporters at the time. Riis, Traversoni and Aldag instead provided the personal insights which did add quite a lot of colour, whilst ONCE's manager appeared to be quite an unreliable narrator despite being cleared of charges.

There were a few passages that just weren't as interesting - the suspension of the race had a lot of opinions without a coherent story on genuinely why it happened - and a lot of the racing is so tainted by subsequent admissions to doping that taking the race itself at face value is a hard ask - maybe Pantani was just doped to peak performance. Maybe some of this has been covered elsewhere but it was a new topic for me and I thought it was an easy read but with some good detail where appropriate.

[Adrian Fingleton · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was looking forward to this one having, over the years, read books by and about many of the figures in modern cycling that are referenced in this book. And yet, this one never took off for me. Despite an interesting cast of characters, some rather unprecedented events in the 1998 Tour de France, and an ability to secure interviews with several interested parties, it's quite a flat account of the event and it's repercussions. There are some excruciatingly simplistic (and lazy?) impressions of Ireland and Irish people near the start (that year Le Tour began in Dublin) and thereafter - for me at least - the book never rises above the level of an account of the building sense of fear and uncertainty among the riders, most of whom were regular participants in the then drug culture of EPO, and worse. The end section, post Tour, where UCI's responses to ongoing drug issues and doping in cycling are considered is dense and - again - not especially engaging. Not sure really what I was expecting from this book, but I found it quite a disappointing read.

[Drew Hayden · Rating 3 out of 5]

A pretty solid read. I feel like the book is well structured and for the most part gets better as it goes on. The first couple chapters feel a bit disjointed. The chapters tell the story of a stage of the race or notable event occurring in the 98 tour but then also what ever topic the author thinks is relevant. Sometimes it’s more cohesive than others. There’s also a few weird grammar/spelling errors which seemed more quirky than malicious. The book got me thinking about cycling and doping but really just made me think about Lance Armstrong since I was a child in the 2000s and that is my only memory of professional cycling before Chris Froome. The author cites lots of other books that also seem like more interesting reads. I’m glad I read it and would recommend it to other cycling fans but I’m not sure there’s much here for non-enthusiasts.

[Akin]

Comprehensive, but not exhaustingly so. Oddly enough, this was the first TdF that I watched on a day to day basis. Pantani stuffing his jersey with newspapers at the top of…Tourmalet? before swooping down like an eagle remains one of my indelible Tour memories.

Not much of the broader narrative about the Festina affair registered at the time. Certainly, I was naive enough to think that there was no context to the cyclists’ rough handling other than Gallic ‘panache’.

We’ve learnt a lot since then.

[Carl · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a book about one of the more important Tours de France given the history of doling within the sport. That tour deserves a solid recounting, but this is not the book for it. It reads a lot like someone who is used to writing more condensed pieces trying to stretch to a book-length manuscript and it just doesn’t work. It’s poorly organized and choppy, and it ultimately gets facts across better than building a true narrative. The touchstone work on the 1998 Tour is elsewhere.

[Daeny · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think the ending claim here is so important - the doping questions have been popping up again in the 2021 tour, with the questions thrown at tadej and matej’s questionable stage win gesture. Also gives more context to 2006 and later. Anyway vibes to when I read the 202 page wada report on Armstrong’s doping in high school

[Leanna Solomin · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was entertaining and engaging, but was a bit confusing to me at first because I hadn’t known many of the terms or athletes the author was referencing. There were a lot of players involved in the affair, so if you don’t focus on the story while reading, you get confused because of the volume of material involved. Otherwise, a really good read!

[Michael Tomasiewicz · Rating 4 out of 5]

I learned so much about a sport that has always intrigued me. I had no idea what was really going on. So many names and places that it was a bit confusing, and the author kept dropping French words in the middle of sentences ... kept me busy.

[Filip Olšovský · Rating 4 out of 5]

There is enough insight for both the competitive and doping part of the 1998 tour to make this an almost fascinating read. The only disadvantage is obvious from a distance – the book could be 100-150 pages shorter and it would be just perfect.

[randy brich · Rating 5 out of 5]

A satisfying journey through time.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a really enjoyable read although a little verbose in spots (otherwise would have been a 5 star)

[Signe R. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Comprehensive, but oftentimes too verbose and caught up in ‘the magic’ of cycling and not the staggering issues of doping. Would still recommend.

[Will Partridge · Rating 2 out of 5]

A very interesting story, but unfortunately not one that was particularly well communicated here.

[Robbie Tyrie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Probably my favorite book about drugs in cycling in the Armstrong era. It really goes into detail on the why and how and puts you back into the realm of abuse in sport in the dark times.

[Susan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I struggled with this book. Mr. Fotheringham obviously is well versed in cycling and the people involved. But this book is written for someone who also knows the cycling world well. I was overwhelmed with the rapid fire information and constant jumping around. I think if I knew more about the events and people involved I might have found the details provided fascinating. I am obviously not the audience for this book.

A preview copy of this book was provided by NetGalley and Bloomsbury USA in exchange for an honest review.

[Harry · Rating 1 out of 5]

A very poor read. Alasdair Fotheringham doesn't even try to engage the reader, just plods through one stage after the next. This happened and then this happened and then this happened. The prose is flatter than Roger Rivière's tyre at the end of his Hour record. The readability isn't helped by the typographical errors. Or the abundance of factual errors. I expected more from this book.