---
product_id: 18482867
title: "Rough Ride: Behind the Wheel With a Pro Cyclist (Yellow Jersey Cycling Classics)"
brand: "paul kimmage"
price: "$50"
currency: NZD
in_stock: true
reviews_count: 9
url: https://www.desertcart.nz/products/18482867-rough-ride-behind-the-wheel-with-a-pro-cyclist-yellow
store_origin: NZ
region: New Zealand
---

# Rough Ride: Behind the Wheel With a Pro Cyclist (Yellow Jersey Cycling Classics)

**Brand:** paul kimmage
**Price:** $50
**Availability:** ✅ In Stock

## Quick Answers

- **What is this?** Rough Ride: Behind the Wheel With a Pro Cyclist (Yellow Jersey Cycling Classics) by paul kimmage
- **How much does it cost?** $50 with free shipping
- **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship
- **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.nz](https://www.desertcart.nz/products/18482867-rough-ride-behind-the-wheel-with-a-pro-cyclist-yellow)

## Best For

- paul kimmage enthusiasts

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- Trusted paul kimmage brand quality
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## Description

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## Images

![Rough Ride: Behind the Wheel With a Pro Cyclist (Yellow Jersey Cycling Classics) - Image 1](https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51P3GZBSy1L.jpg)
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## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 







  
  
    Rough Ride: Behind the Wheel With a Pro Cyclist
  

*by J***I on Reviewed in the United States on March 16, 2020*

What a Great Read .It's about personal experience and life as a pro cyclist, the good, bad, and in between .Very revealing from Amphetamines to Blood Doping, how the "doping controls' were conducted, and the mentality by the powers that be Looking the other way .Although years before LA, it gives new meaning to the words " I've NEVER tested positive "

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 







  
  
    Highly recommended
  

*by K***R on Reviewed in the United States on October 24, 2013*

There are others more informed in cycling who can give a more detailed review than I. I gave up on cycling after a few rides, it was not the sport for me, but I follow pro racing on television and in magazines. It seems so glamorous. But I wanted to know what it's really like. This book gives you so much insight, if you follow pro cycling you may never see it quite the same way again. The glamour is reserved for a very few. For guys like Paul, second rate riders (if you can call a pro rider second rate!), the cycling life has just a quickly passing hint glamour and brief moments of joy but mostly it's a very, very tough slog, not only on the courses themselves but dealing with the other riders.Paul shows how tightly knit the community of riders is and what he had to put up with as someone who spoke up against doping. I think that culture may have changed now, as riders in 2013 have turned viciously against dopers in an effort to clean up the sport and their own reputations - but Paul was a pioneer in that regard. He writes about the bitter rejection he received and the abusive letters that came his way from members of the cycling establishment and then the media establishment, once he became a journalist and wrote about cycling.Even though my knowledge of pro cycling is not what I would call great, I enjoyed this book immensely for its candour and for the revelations about a life lived on two wheels. For sure it's easier today for riders (Paul had to wash his own kit - unthinkable today), but the grim aspects of life as a domestique survive to this day I'm sure.  The book is well written and compelling, and I found it hard to put down.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 







  
  
    It's a re-buy, it's that good
  

*by C***Y on Reviewed in the United States on November 24, 2009*

This book is written by an idealistic Irish national champion who thought to make a career of himself as a professional cyclist. What he found out is that system as it exists uses up its riders like disposable cameras. He had ambitions of glory or at least success, only to find that his talent is common in the pro ranks. What he describes is what it takes to exist as a professional cyclist - the wear and tear on the body and the pounding on the psyche. Hired as a domestique, his job is to support the big guns, the stars. Yet he is compensated on his own personal racing results, which are earned only when he is released from his supporting duties. For lesser riders like him, doping is the logical and even professional way of being able to perform. His transgressions are minor - caffeine suppositories, and trial use of speed, which he discards as just too *visible*. Eventually he drops out of cycling as he transitions into another line of work, sports reporting. His message is that it is the system that is broken - open knowledge of which events are not dope-controlled, the compensation system that expects riders to sacrifice their own results to those of the team, yet get paid on the basis of their criterium results. Most of all it is the code of silence that keeps all the riders mum and reinforces the idea that there is no alternative.He speaks from the point of view of the average rider. While he is tight with the Irish greats of his day (Tour de France winner Stephen Roche and TdF points winner Sean Kelly), he can't and doesn't speak of them beyond his personal experiences from sharing hotel rooms, training rides and personal relationships. If you are looking for a tell-all book about the greats of the Tour de France, you will not find it here. This is his story, no one else's. It's not a comprehensive book about sports doping or even doping in the professional peleton. What made his story notorious in its time was the fact that he dared to speak of it at all. His transgressions were minor but his story ostracized him from his cycling generation for years.He updated the booking in 2005, when he ventured back into that world, albeit as a journalist rather than a rider. Things had changed yet stayed the same. His point of view is tainted now, in that he sees doping everywhere, just in a more sophisticated form than in his day.This book is interesting not so much for the details but for the pressures on the riders to perform and to do anything/everything that the others must do. You and I have long commutes and sedentary lives that are required by our jobs; they have different job constraints that are just as binding, only theirs will kill them sooner. What a life! Thanks, Paul, for letting us see this life from your point of view.

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*Product available on Desertcart New Zealand*
*Store origin: NZ*
*Last updated: 2026-01-22*