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Review
"A Dog in a Hat is the most authentic book ever written on making a living as a pro cyclist in Europe." — Bob Roll, Versus Tour de France cycling commentator
“Is A Dog in a Hat the best book we've ever read about bike racing? Undeniably yes. The essential truths you'll learn about Belgian bike racing are timeless. And the self-effacing (and often hilarious) way Joe narrates the absurdity of these traditions will make you laugh out loud. Of everything written about bike racing throughout the history of mankind, Chapter 3, "Kermis Don't Play Fair," is the most important 20 pages ever penned. No one should be permitted to own a USA Cycling license without being able to recite this chapter from heart. You'll be fascinated by Joe’s humility, his determination, and by the warped way domestiques set their goals and weigh success.” — CompetitiveCyclist.com
"A Dog in a Hat is a page turner. Anyone who has raced in Europe or who wonders what it's like to jump the ocean on your own should pick up this book. Joe captures the struggle and the intensity to succeed, and the fact that he did it on his own is all the more impressive. Cycling in Europe is tough; doing it Joe's way is even tougher!" — Frankie Andreu
“Parkin’s commentary is riveting, offering an insider look into the sport that few get to see, let alone experience.” — Mountain Bike magazine
"I loved A Dog in a Hat. Joe's stories bring back many memories of racing in Belgium, where I learned how to fight for position in the echelon, to suffer in the gutter while jumping curbs and dodging potholes, and to pound out my guts when it really mattered. Belgium is a hard place to learn bicycle racing and Joe's story proves how tough he was." —Ron Kiefel
"This plain, self-deprecating memoir has the ring of authenticity at the other end of the sport where—even today—not all the riders are being paid, the hotels are still bad, and the races are just as hard." —TinDonkey.com
"Joe Parkin is a beautiful piece of work, and he turns out to be a better writer than I am a bike racer." —Bill Strickland, Bicycling magazine
“[Readers] have a seat in the middle of the peloton as we see what Joe sees, breathe what he smells, watch as his peers juice up and we struggle with him as he strives to get out in front of it all. Parkin’s words weave a colorful tapestry about living life on the bicycle racing circuit in Europe. Yet that tapestry is soiled and tattered because of the true cutthroat nature of bicycle racing and the absolute grit in the stories Joe relives for us.” — Dirt Rag magazine
"Sordid, funny, and engrossing." — Bike Snob NYC
"Joe tells his story straight. It's not pretty, but it's not bitter." — BikeRadar.com
"Impossible to put down." — Mountain Bike Action magazine
"Parkin went native in an era when Americans were still exotic creatures, and not in a good way. This unglamorized insider's view is what makes A Dog in a Hat well worth reading. Parkin shows you life on the edge of the peloton. We know the great champions' stories, but Parkin's experience is far more illustrative of what a "pro cyclist" really is." — PodiumCafe.com
"A slice of literary badassness. I've had a lifelong struggle maintaining an attention span for reading books, but this is a page turner that's been hard for me to put down. A Dog in a Hat is truly captivating." — HowtoAvoidtheBummerLife.com
“Joe Parkin’s heart was in racing on the road in Belgium and it is eloquently stated in his book. You should read A Dog in a Hat if you looking for a few small glimpses of the life experiences of a guy that lived the hard life.” — Steve Tilford, former professional cyclist
“An honest, well-written insight into what it’s like to move to Europe and try to make it as a pro racer. A Dog in a Hat is funny, touching, brave, and honest in its look at the complicated world of the European pro cycling scene.” — The Independent
"Parkin has written an eloquent and historic volume. In the very uniqueness of his story, Parkin realizes a universality that gives his recollections a resonance with any cyclist. Do not miss this book." — BelgiumKneeWarmers.com
"A Dog in a Hat reads like Joe Parkin was just telling you these epic stories on a ride, up a climb, or at a coffee shop. That's the beauty of this book. It's not a hero's journey, but instead a racer's tale." — BikeHugger.com
"There's something very approachable about the underdog, the guy who works as hard as anyone, but never achieves the stardom we all chase. I peeled through A Dog in a Hat in a few nights, always wanting to know what was coming next. Joe's candor is refreshing to read and entertaining as hell." — PezCyclingNews.com
"Written as if you were riding alongside him, Parkin's A Dog in a Hat is a quick, highly addictive read. You can feel the cobbles under the pen." — Cog Magazine
"A Dog in a Hat reads like a novel and serves up an inspiring, compelling and captivating racer's tale." — The Oregonian
"I loved A Dog in a Hat. Once in, I couldn't put it down. The book rings of truth, youth, and passion." — Andreas Hestler
"A Dog in a Hat is not the idealised notion most of us have of the life of a professional cyclist, but it's all the more gutsy and enjoyable for its self-effacing honesty. I could read it all over again right now." — TheWashingMachinePost.net
"In his new book, A Dog in a Hat, Joe Parkin gives us a window into the life of someone who was born to be a professional bike racer. It’s not pretty, it’s not glamorous, some of it is a bit of inside baseball, but it’s a great read. I picked up a copy at Interbike, brought it home and read the 232 pages over the course of two evenings. I literally could not put it down." — Smithers Minneapolis
"The April 17, 2000 issue of VeloNews closed with a typically fervent Bob Roll screed entitled “51 Things To Do Before You Die". "#36. Learn from Joe Parkin's life story." Parkin’s prose fills in all the cracks. Quite simply, the man is tough as nails and chose the absolute hardest way to break into European professional cycling: just showing up in Ghent with a bike, a duffel bag of clothes, three months worth of cash, and a phone number to call scrawled on a scrap of paper. You can truly appreciate Parkin's re-living of the squalid truth of late ’80s Euro pro cycling." —BobkeStrut.com
"It's a wild, gritty, page-turning ride: Grab the book, rub some embrocation into your quads and calves, and settle into your couch for a great read as you plot your own future bike exploits." — Cyclo-club.com
“Joe Parkin did what few other Americans dared do…A Dog in a Hat fills a void in cycling literature. Since so few Americans have accomplished what Joe Parkin has, his book stands on its own as an original account of European bike racing, presented from a racing cyclist’s perspective.” — USCyclingReport.com
“A Dog in a Hat is a fast-paced, revealing read, and any cyclist who enjoys racing will be equally inspired and shocked at some of the stuff that goes on inside the peloton. It's a rare glimpse into a world often concealed, and Parkin’s struggle to gain acceptance makes the book a truly inspiring read.” — RoadCyclingUK.com
Product Description
In 1987, Joe Parkin was an amateur bike racer in California when he ran into Bob Roll, a pro on the powerhouse Team 7-Eleven. "Lobotomy Bob" told Parkin that, to become a pro, he must go to Belgium. Riding along a canal in Belgium years later, Roll encountered Parkin, who he described as "a wraith, an avenging angel of misery, a twelve-toothed assassin". Roll barely recognized him. Belgium had forged Parkin into a pro, and changed him forever. A Dog in a Hat is Joe's remarkable story.
Parkin lays it all out: the drugs, the payoffs, the betrayals, the battles for contracts, the endless promises, and the glory of racing day after day. A Dog in a Hat is the unforgettable story of the un-ordinary education of Joe Parkin and his love affair with racing, set in the hard place in the world to be a bike racer.
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Most helpful customer reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
Rough & honest and as fast as a Belgium Kermesse...,
By HarryH (Vancouver) - See all my reviews
This review is from: A Dog in a Hat: An American Bike Racer's Story of Mud, Drugs, Blood, Betrayal, and Beauty in Belgium (Paperback)
Joe Parkin offers a different view to the usual accounts of racing in Europe. His world is a rough and ready place, where trying to keep your head above the water, in the European peleton is the name of the game. Good to read about someone who struggles, for a change, and takes success where and when he can, and works for it...Well worth a read... it's rough, honest and as fast as a Belgium Kermesse.
1 of 5 people found the following review helpful
2.0 out of 5 stars
Read it but didn't like it,
By
This review is from: A Dog in a Hat: An American Bike Racer's Story of Mud, Drugs, Blood, Betrayal, and Beauty in Belgium (Paperback)
Hey, author Joe. We get it. You're an American and you're doing a sport that is predominantly made up of Europeans. But do you really have to mention it again. And again. And then again. Enough already! Maybe if you'd spent more time writing about racing and less time feeling sorry for yourself as being an American on tour in Europe, you would have written a better book!
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
3.8 out of 5 stars (102 customer reviews) 36 of 39 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Blue-Collar Bike Racing, European-Style,
By Leslie Reissner "Sprocketboy" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: A Dog in a Hat: An American Bike Racer's Story of Mud, Drugs, Blood, Betrayal, and Beauty in Belgium (Paperback)
We all have in our own imagination ideas of what pro cycling is all about. When I was at the Tour de France in 2006 I was impressed by the professionalism of everything: the course organization, from barriers to route markings; the television coverage; the team buses-including the one I passed that smelled like a laundromat as I walked by since they were using the on-board washing machines! "A Dog in a Hat," the story of an American professional cyclist racing in Europe from 1987 to 1991, has none of these things and it probably gives a better impression of what pro cycling is really like, even today, than the rarified snippets we get from the top-level teams.Joe Parkin was racing in California as an amateur when he met Team 7-Eleven racer Bob Roll, who told him to go to Belgium to race if he wanted to get serious. The hard-working Mr. Roll, who also wrote the, uh, colourful introduction to the book, is famous for his cycling work ethic and odd behavior, was right: it is hard to imagine a place where cycling is taken more seriously than Belgium. So the innocent author makes his way to Europe to Brussels and moves in with the Albert Claeys family in Ursel. Albert, who owned a bar and sometimes drove a truck, was well-known as a sort of godfather to American cyclists in Europe, helping them to get established and find a team, as well as providing a bed. The book describes in entertaining detail what it is like to be at the bottom of the pro ranks. Mr. Parkin had dreams of becoming King of the Mountains and felt that his talent was most suited to the shorter stage races. But it quickly becomes obvious just how difficult it is to even finish a race, let alone win one. As time goes on, Joe Parkin comes to the realization that he will not be King of the Mountains but has to accept that he is a good worker, a domestique, and that his role is that of a support rider. Along the way this naive American, who on first hearing Flemish mistook it for Russian, becomes a kind of Belgian-American hybrid, absorbing the language and holding his own in the cycling culture. This is a culture that prizes toughness above all, and in his spare style he talks about the mud, the crashes, the disappointment. At the lowest level the environment is terrible, with talentless teammates, hotel rooms so awful it makes you laugh, and not much money when it actually does get paid. He has not papers to allow him be in Belgium, something that does not trouble team management very much, even when it means he will be deported. He does not shrink from describing the all-pervasive use of drugs in cycling, and the fixing of races. The description of the drug use would be hilarious except for the ultimate repercussions: riders will take anything with minimal concern: the reactions range from getting faster to getting stupid. Doping controls seem minimal at best and team management does nothing to discourage illegal practices. But as he improves Joe clearly enjoys being a professional-a European pro. Racing against amateurs in the UK's Milk Race or in races in the United States he is contemptuous of their lack of skill and discipline. When writing to team time trials, he talks of the focus and teamwork needed to succeed. He is proud of being able to control a race, going ahead and setting the pace and hauling back breakaways. Probably his greatest contribution was helping his team leader, Luc Roosen, win the 1991 Tour de Suisse. But in the end there is no new contract forthcoming (even though some of the team leaders consider pooling enough of their own money to let him ride at a minimum wage!) and he returned to the States. In 1992 he watched his teammates ride the Tour de France on television. He never went back to Flanders, and after doing some racing in the United States and then switching to mountain bikes he ended his career in 1997. This book presupposes some understanding of the sport of bike racing, although explanations are given about race strategy in some cases, but does not require any in-depth knowledge to enjoy. At the time of his Belgian adventures, Joe Parkin was one of only a handful of North Americans in European pro racing, all in the shadow of the mighty Greg Lemond who was considered such a superior cyclist that he was seen as some kind of freak, beyond any national classification. The title of this book, "A Dog in a Hat," is a translation of a Flemish expression meaning something unusual-Joe Parkin was told while racing to look for changes, to look for the dog, to indicate what was happening in the race. As an American racing for a European team in the late 1980s Joe Parkin was a kind of dog in a hat himself. The cycling public is served up stories about Lance Armstrong's victories over and over again as if the Tour de France is the only race but this plain, self-deprecating memoir has the ring of authenticity at the other end of the sport where even today not all the riders are being paid, the hotels are still bad and the races just as hard. 27 of 33 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars
A journeyman book by a journeyman rider,
By R. Kaufmann - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: A Dog in a Hat: An American Bike Racer's Story of Mud, Drugs, Blood, Betrayal, and Beauty in Belgium (Paperback)
Pre-release customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program
This is the story as told by a middle-of-the-road American professional bicycle racer, Joe Parkin. Mr. Parkin raced in Europe for a variety of professional teams, and found his biggest success as someone who would control a race for his team -- as opposed to try and win it for himself.The book is completely linear, with no real theme or fabric that would make it more than the sum of its parts. Each chapter just tells what happened during one particular race, season or training period. On the positive side, this book just reeks of authenticity. It's neither a whitewash nor a "tell-all." In fact, controversial subjects like doping and buying/selling race wins are discussed a flat way with very little moralizing. I came away with a real sympathy for the plight of racers, and an appreciation of the grim reality of the racing world. After reading the book, I feel that a much better book would have been possible if Mr. Parkin's editor had made him discuss bicycle racing's current status through the lens of his own career. In fact, this book reads more like a time capsule journal that some other author will use as source material. Bottom line: it could have been funnier, more insightful or more introspective. It couldn't have been more authentic. There's value in that! 9 of 10 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
One Wild Ride,
By Bicycle Day - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: A Dog in a Hat: An American Bike Racer's Story of Mud, Drugs, Blood, Betrayal, and Beauty in Belgium (Paperback)
Pre-release customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program
July 4, 1987.For Joe Parkin, that date provided special fireworks, as he signed his first professional cycling contract after a year of showing his stuff in the European amateur ranks. It was a start of wild ride of chasing dreams as - what the Belgians call - "a dog with a hat on" (something familiar, yet decidedly out of place). The sketches in the memoir chronicle the five years that Parkin rode in the professional peloton as one of the few Americans competing full-time in Europe. Parkin mixes the craziness of the mobile road show with the controversies and tragedies that continue to grip the sport. "The European teams of that era (in Belgium especially) didn't think highly of goody-two-shoes riders," he writes. "Like the vaunted Blue Code of Silence among police, pro bike racing definitely had the Lycra Code of Silence." But some initial impressions cover the entire course. Parkin was not impressed with the already bitter cyclist, Paul Kimmage, which was several years before he published a controversial book - Rough Ride - that exposed the shadows within professional cycling, including the illegal drug use on teams. Parkin says he mostly avoided the performance-enhancing drugs of the day, only once taking a mixture of pop and a chalky substance during a particularly tough spot in a semi-classic event. It was given to him by a team official when he complained of an upset stomach. "Many of the team managers, teammates, friends, and fans I had while living in Belgium would have looked at not taking the drugs as a failure to give 100 percent to being a cyclist," Parkin writes. "A doctor once told me that a well-trained athlete can find about 85 percent of his potential, whereas a well-trained athlete on amphetamines will be able to perform at 105 percent." But through such pressure comes some incredibly hilarious moments. At one point, Parkin found himself being deported from Belgium when it could not be officially determined what cycling entity was paying his salary and he had a number of high-speed moments in cabs and team vehicles while just trying to get to events. A brief conversation with Greg LeMond during one major event - as the pair struggled in the back of the pack - found the legendary Tour de France champion heeding some tough advice from the journeyman. "'You'd better quit, man. I can't see that we're possibly going to be going any slower,'" Parkin said. Later, LeMond dropped out of the Tour of Ireland. But in an era when contracts could be negotiated with handshakes, Parkin seemed to be a day late in finding one during the closing months of what became his final season as a European road racer. He eventually switched to mountain bikes and infrequently returned to Europe for competitions. And though he may not have had the form to stand on the podium after a major event - and never competed in the Tour de France - Parkin wears a yellow jersey for sharing his recollections on this trek during a special time in American cycling: "....I smile when I tell the stories because my body has long since forgotten the pain I asked it to endure." |
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