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It is said that the Olympic Games is not about winning but taking part. Perhaps for some. I prefer another maxim--the one that someone used before Atlanta: "If you're not here to win, you're a tourist."
Completed in the run-up to Sydney 2000--where he crowned an already remarkable career with a record-breaking Gold in the coxless fours--A Golden Age is Steve Redgrave's account of a life spent exercising a will to win.
As you might expect--given Redgrave's renowned enthusiasm for stifling the hyperbole of gushing reporters--Britain's greatest Olympian doesn't bother to linger long in celebration, choosing instead to chronicle the realities of a 25-year obsession with exploring his physical and mental limits.
But by focusing on the lifetime behind those few minutes of glory every four years, and measuring the true cost of success--his struggles with diabetes and colitis, and the wall he recognises he has built between himself and his young family--Redgrave leaves the reader with no doubts as to the enormity of his achievement.
A frank critic of himself, Redgrave's assessments of the strengths and shortcomings of his rowing partners--most famously, Matthew Pinsent and Andy Holmes--and accounts of the behind-the-scenes drama of top-flight competition, are equally clear-sighted and revealing.
Olympic Gold in endurance events at five consecutive Games is a unique achievement, and A Golden Age is an engrossing self-study by the man who made it happen.Alex Hankin --Ce texte fait référence à une édition épuisée ou non disponible de ce titre.
