The Lance Armstrong mystique runs deep. Here's a guy who's conquered testicular cancer and won the Tour de France a jaw-dropping seven times, against all odds, and who now says he's coming out of retirement to try for win number eight. Plus, as far as the local angle goes, he's become a Coloradan by setting down roots in Aspen, where celebrity is the norm, making him just that much more interesting to the rest of us who live in these parts.
Is Lance one of us? Hard to say -- but if anyone knows who the "Boss" really is, it's Boulder journalist John Wilcockson, a Tour de France authority with an osmotic insight into the champion cyclist; his account of the tour, 23 Days in July, was named one of ESPN's "Top 10 Sports Books of the Year." Wilcockson's new biography, Lance: The Making of the World's Greatest Champion, leaves no stone uncovered when it comes to Armstrong, delving into the psychology of his unstoppable ambition while laying out the supreme cycling champion's rise to fame and combining in-depth interviews with a timeline of important events in the Tour topper's life. It's got it all, from the thrill of victory to the downside of doping allegations and negative media. It's just the thing to polish off before the 2009 Tour begins on July 4.
Wilcockson will sign copies of the book tonight at 7:30 p.m. at the Tattered Cover LoDo, 1628 16th Street; go to www.tatteredcover.com or call 303-436-1070 to learn more. Or catch him tomorrow at 7:30 p.m. in Boulder at the Boulder Book Store, 1107 Pearl Street; visit www.boulderbookstore.com or call 303-447-2074 for those details. Pedal on over and join the fray.
For more ways to rock the night and kill the day, go to westword.com/calendar.
