Tim Moore · 2001 · overland

Tim Moore's 2001 comic travelogue. A hopelessly unfit Englishman who hasn't ridden a bike in years decides to cycle the entire route of the Tour de France, all two thousand miles of it, weeks before the professionals, cheating and suffering and overeating his way around the anticlockwise loop of the 2000 Tour, from the start in the west to the Champs-Elysees in Paris.

1. 1
   Futuroscope

   The hopeless amateur Tim Moore sets off from the western start of the 2000 Tour to ride the whole route before the professionals do.

2. 2
   Brittany

   A loop north into Brittany before the road turns back on itself.

3. 3
   The Pyrenees

   South to the brutal climbs of the Pyrenees, walked and cursed as much as ridden.

4. 4
   Mont Ventoux

   East across Provence to the wind-scoured Giant of Provence, where Tom Simpson once died.

5. 5
   The Alps

   The great Alpine cols, the Galibier and the Izoard, where the amateur becomes, almost, a cyclist.

6. 6
   Alsace

   North through the Alps and a brush with Switzerland and Germany, crossing the Rhine in Alsace.

7. 7
   Paris

   And at last the traditional finish on the Champs-Elysees in Paris.