Best sports book

[Mount Suribachi]

Inspired by the favourite books thread, I am wondering what your favourite sports books are.

For me the following stand out

Its not about the bike - Lance Armstrong. On their own the story of his fight against cancer and the story of his winning the Tour de France make compelling reading. Together they are utterly amazing. Reading the book it is very clear that Armstrong is an incredibly driven person, with a lot of internal anger that drives him on (he reminds me a lot of Roy Keane in this respect), this combined with the fact that he is a physical freak makes him the all-time great athlete that he is

The Game - Ken Dryden. Dryden was the goaltender for the 1970s Montreal Canadians, possibly the greatest hockey team of all time. One of the most cerebral players ever to play proffesional sport (how many other sportsmen do you know who take a year off at the height of their career to go finish their law degrees?). His book is a wonderful insight into what makes a great team great. Indeed, much of what he says could be applied to other great teams in other great sports. As one review of the book I read pointed out, you don't need to be a Hockey fan to enjoy this book. For every Bowman, Lafleur, Shutt and Robinson just substitute Ferguson, Giggs, Cantona and Pallister.


Fever Pitch - Nick Hornby. One mans story of a lifelong obession with Arsenal FC, this book is a must for every football fan around the world. Hornby eloquently expresses the feelings of every football fan as to why they love their team and their sport. If you're not a football fan and you wonder why people love watching 22 blokes kick a little white ball round a grassy field then read, and let Horny explain it all to you. Its one of those books where you want to grab friends and family and read out entire passages to them to make them understand your passion for The Beautiful Game.

Opening Up - Mike Atherton. With an honours degree in History from Cambridge University, athers is obviously a smart cookie. His book is a fascinating insight into his career, the game of cricket, and life as a proffesional sportsman in the modern era. He pulls no punches and plenty of team-mates receive criticism from him, but its always done in a proffesional and clinical manner, there is no animosity involved as you find out things about players like Robin Smith, Mark Ramprakash and Phil Tufnell that weren't previously common knowledge.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

Into Thin Air -Jon Krakauer. Not sure this qualifies as a sports book, it's about climbing mount everest. Was very interesting reading.

[Hosakawa Tito]

I saw the title to this thread and immediately thought Las Vegas.
My favorite is "Pride of the Yankees", the Lou Gherig story.

[English assassin]

If we can have into thin air then we can have Touching the void by Joe Simpson.

The WORST sports book I ever read was Carl Fogarty's biography. Before I read it I thought he was a biking god who was, OK, a bit cocky, but had a right to be.

After I read it I thought he was an arrogant humourless boring git without a single redeeming human characteristic.