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the escape - the tour, the cyclist and me. pippa york and david walsh. mudlark publishing hardback. 344pp. £22

one of my friends at college was apt to make judgments of those he met and, oddly, never change that first opinion no matter how matters subsequently progressed. thankfully, he seemed to be reasonably accurate in his first appraisals, meaning life was still bearable for all as time rolled on. but occasionally he was somewhat wide of the mark; those who turned out to be a great deal more amenable than originally judged, could still be given short shrift or ignored altogether. and often controversially, he remained good friends with those who certainly did not have his best interests at heart.

personally, i embrace the concept of change; there are those who seemed highly unlikely to become good friends on first meetings, are now amongst those with whom i'm likely still to spend time. others turned out not to be who i thought they were. i think the latter approach is more applicable to the majority, but whatever your own means of assessment, it's still highly likely that you won't truly know what goes on behind the individual you meet and talk with on a regular basis.

strangely, we seem less likely to make pertinent evaluation of those we regard as our heroes, often blinded by the way they are portrayed, since it's not always the case that you get to meet those you admire. we can gauge the personality of some via interviews in print, or those broadcast by means of television or podcast, suspending the knowledge that, in the case of cyclists, they are representing themselves and the team and sponsors for whom they ride. many of the top professionals have been given media training, to ensure they come across in the manner dictated by the team. that's not to say the majority of professional cyclists aren't decent, friendly individuals, if sometimes a tad eccentric, but it might be folly to base judgment on a 30 second interview prior to or following a tour de france stage.

mentioned in this book co-authored by pippa york (formerly robert millar) and times sports journalist, david walsh, is keith bingham's post stage interview with the 1985 robert millar following a dismal tour stage. bingham makes every effort to draw relevant comment from a despondent millar, while the latter lives up to his dour reputation by offering as few words as possible. at the time, millar's apparent personality traits were put down to his glasgow upbringing, a reputation rightly or wrongly shared by many glaswegians. there are those of us, particularly if actually born in glasgow (my hand is up), who (not so) secretly admired millar's stance for no reason other than it personified a scots characteristic which seemed cool, but in fact was, for the majority, quite far from the truth.

but neither bingham, nor any of millar's large fanbase, had the faintest idea why robert behaved that way, nor what was taking place in his life. because, truth be told, it was none of our business; and also because very few top professional cyclists are in the sport for reasons of popularity and being asked often trite questions after riding 150km over several pyrenean mountain tops. not for nothing is the oft repeated advice not to meet your heroes.

'the escape' is a stunning insight into the life of one of britain's finest cyclists, for many a long year, the only uk rider to have worn one of the tour's jerseys on the podium in paris, and reaching the highest position in the general classification (fourth in 1984). at the time of writing, walsh and york had jointly reported on three tours de france, she for cyclingnews and walsh for the times and sunday times. sharing a car and staying at the same hotels, their conversations included not only that which unfolded before them, but the secret life of robert millar en route to becoming philippa york.

it's an authorial strategy that could easily have failed; i confess it took a few chapters before i stopped thinking it to be a mistake. let's just say it's not the format i had expected. however, it turned out to verge on genius.

perhaps it's another scottish trait? i once attended an evening with graeme obree, who began by saying absolutely nothing was off the table. though pippa refrains from using those exact words, that is the end result. it is a complete revelation to learn that millar's gender dysphoria began while at school.

"And the girls? [...] He doesn't want to play with the girls over there. He wants to be one of them."

and if i might refer back to my college friend, walsh turned out to be not the sort of reporter i had been led to believe was the case. it transpires that, in this case, he is the perfect interlocutor, not shying away from asking the awkward questions ("Given the dysphoria, and the stuff that was unresolved in your head, could you really have had a marriage that worked?") and since they are both working on the tour as journalists, there's not only discussion of pippa's past, but pertinent observations on which of the three weeks they are entrenched ("Roglic says the speed at which Pogacar went makes no sense to him. They didn't mention the word 'doping'. They didn't need to.")

there is no grandstanding by either, and no false modesty. we learn more about pippa than any of us would likely reveal about ourselves, but we also learn of robert millar's career, races won and lost, opinions of team-mates and directeurs sportifs; much of what you'd expect from a book at least in part, written by a former top professional. you won't suddenly become pippa's friend, nor you hers, but you will be able to base any latent hero worship on far greater knowledge and admiration than you had when beginning chapter one.

wednesday 9 july 2025