The Pyrenees have often served as a dramatic battlefield for the Tour de France and, starting on July 10, the final week of the 2021 edition will see five stages in these mountains. For cycling enthusiasts the Pyrenees experience is a must-do, and a new book by Peter Cossins provides an insider's look at some great riding.

Ed Hood has been following the Tour for many years and having one of his home Scottish riders in the Tour peloton added a certain sparkle. There have only been half a dozen Scots at a Tour Grand Départ, but all were champions.

Ed Hood gave us the top thirteen 'Bad Ass' riders in the pro peloton recently, since then the list has grown. Twelve more 'Bad Ass' riders have made the cut - Tough as they come!

Author Peter Cossins describes in his history of that first 1903 Tour de France, the inelegantly titled “Butcher, Blacksmith, Acrobat, Sweep,” the original Tour de France, something totally new and untried and flawed in many ways, “should be considered as one of the greatest events in sporting history.”

Sports fans love comparisons. Baseball is famous for its obsession with statistics (“The most successful left-handed pitcher throwing against a Chicago team on a Tuesday evening...”) and certainly all sports have record-holders. Pro cycling defies easy comparison of its stars. Can we figure out who was truly The Greatest of All Time?

Jason Saltzman and his Wildlife Generation Pro Cycling team headed off to Africa to ride the Tour of Rwanda, an eight-day stage race in East Africa. A very different experience for Jason, and a great read of us.

Bike racing in 2020 was very strange, things like races with no spectators and Spring Classics in autumn, but the weirdest is the overlapping of the Giro's final week with the Vuelta's first. But in 1981 only three days separated the two races and Giovanni Battaglin, in the new book “48 Days,” tells the astonishing story of how he won both.

With the decisive Giro d'Italia time trial on Sunday, Ed Hood thought it would be a good idea to talk to a man who knows all about aerodynamics and the 'race against the clock' - Dan Bigham. Chrono specialist and aero guru.

It's a sad time for Ed Hood, he should be in Italy for the Giro, but... As the 2021 Giro d'Italia starts later today, Ed has had his Giro photo album out to compile his personal 'Alternative A to Z' of the Italian Grand Tour. We love the Giro and Ed knows the race better than most, take note of his (near) complete guide to everything Giro.