These picks offer something for every sport junkie
These titles on athletes and tournaments take readers from court to track and further afield, delivering pulsating action.
The House of Beckham: Money, Sex and Power
By Tom Bower
Nobody has packaged football and fashion with more style, glamour, finesse and business savvy than David and Victoria Beckham, who built a multibillion-dollar brand by fusing their individual strengths. For the backstory on what they did and how, and the way they handle the constant spotlight on their marriage, watch Beckham, which aired last October. The four-part Netflix docuseries was produced by the pair themselves.
As for fans who crave personal details on the very public icons, investigative biographer Tom Bower offers this book, released in June. It peers into their US$24 million new home in Miami, the US, and looks at their careers, finances and relationship. What the former BBC journalist uncovers is a reality framed by money, sex and power.
Beneath the Surface: My Story
By Michael Phelps with Brian Cazeneuve
Michael Phelps went from ripple at Sydney 2000, his maiden outing, to splash in Athens four years later, winning his first gold medal and smashing the world record for the 400m individual medley.
He won another four gold and two bronze at the meet. Phelps represented the US in four more Olympics, bagging 28 medals in total, 23 of them gold. But behind the glory and ecstasy was agony: his parents’ divorce when he was nine, his attention deficit hyperactivity disorder diagnosis in sixth grade and the intrusive glare of the limelight.
The winner tells it all in this autobiography, from fearing to put his face in water as a toddler to watching his sister not make the grade for the Olympics, training body and mind for competition, retiring after London 2012, returning for more podium finishes and the title of greatest swimmer in the history of the Games.
Searching for Novak: The Man Behind the Enigma
By Mark Hodgkinson
Although beaten by Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz at Wimbledon in the final last week, Novak Djokovic still holds the record for most Grand Slam titles, 24. He topped Forbes magazine’s annual tennis earnings list as at October 2023, raking in about US$38.4 million over the preceding 12 months. The Serbian champ fascinates with his speed, footwork, attacks and composure under pressure.
Fans hail him as “the closest thing to technical perfection tennis has ever seen”. But he courts controversy too, with his anti-vax stand, “magic potion”, emotional outbursts, unorthodox methods of blocking out boos and, lately, pretending to play the violin with his racket — for his daughter who is learning the instrument, he says. Naturally, dethroning Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal, kings who long held centre court, did not win him any favour.
The Illustrated History of Football
By David Squires
With the Henri Delaunay Trophy safely in Spain after Euro 2024, and Mexico preparing to host the Fifa World Cup a third time in 2026, what can fans do besides wait? Pick up David Squire’s anthology of football comics that have appeared in The Guardian and other publications.
The Australia-based illustrator looks at the beautiful game with a gimlet eye and satirises news and views about star players, major meets, defining moments, large-sum transfers, sponsorships and the corruption that muddied the sport. There is cutting humour, honed from when he found he could make his friends laugh.
Until 2014, Squires drew only for himself and a small group of people on Twitter. With the World Cup in Brazil that year, he decided to draw a cartoon for each day of the tournament. The Guardian approached him to do some work and he has drawn weekly cartoons for the British daily ever since.
The Girls: An All-American Town, a Predatory Doctor, and the Untold Story of the Gymnasts Who Brought Him Down
By Abigail Pesta
USA Gymnastics, with its glitzy costumes and nubile girls doing all kinds of impossible twists and turns, hid a dark secret that lay hidden for many years until the “Fierce Five” gold-winning team of 2012 broke their silence. They revealed how Larry Nassar, their former doctor and athletic trainer, sexually abused them under the pretence of dispensing “special treatment”. Their graphic testimonies prompted many more to come forward with their own shocking stories, among them GOAT Simone Biles.
In 2018, Nassar was sentenced to up to 175 years’ jail, after 156 women and girls told the court what he had done to them over two decades, how various people they tried to talk to brushed them off, and how systemic apathy let them down. Biles said: “We have been failed … I know now it was not my fault … I know this horrific experience does not define me.”
On Someone Else’s Nickel: A Life in Television, Sports, and Travel
By Tim Ryan
If you have had to camp on a friend’s sofa this past month to catch late-night Euro telecasts, imagine the thrill of upfront access to the biggest sporting events around the globe. Canadian Tim Ryan accumulated more than 50 years of broadcast experience at 10 Olympic Games, over 300 championship boxing matches, Wimbledon and US Open tennis matches, World Cup skiing events and many other meets, working for NBC, CBS and Fox in the US. He covered 30 sports in more than 20 countries, sizing up the action on court and field in his “soothing voice, at an unflustered pace”.
He remembers fondly things that happened along the way, in this memoir: crash landing in South Africa’s Namib desert, being charged at by a rhinoceros in Zimbabwe, herding sheep at the start of a Winter Olympics telecast and hosting a tennis tournament that featured the McEnroe brothers to raise money for an Alzheimer’s association. These led to friendships with pals and colleagues in sport that have endured.
Sports Nutrition
By Kim Lim
Sport is not always played out on a level playing field, but good food and eating habits can give professional athletes a leg-up. Kim Lim traces the impact of sports nutrition on performance, why hydration is crucial and the suitable diets for different games.
Following evidence-based recommendations, she counts calories, vitamins and minerals. Nutrients help boost recovery, so it is important to know when exactly to take them — pre-workout, during workout or when you are ready to tuck in after you are clean and feeling invigorated. Supplements promise better performance but some are not necessary or may even have health risks.
Lim also addresses weight management and eating disorders in athletes and the psychological and behavioural effects of following a sports diet. You don’t have to be a pro or preparing for competition to dip into this book because a tool that helps the body use food effectively and efficiently benefits everyone.
Chasing AllieCat
By Rebecca Fjelland Davis
It is summer and Sadie Lester is geared up to start mountain bike racing. But she is sent to her aunt and uncle’s crowded house in Minnesota, where she foresees boredom shadowing the next few months. Then the 16-year-old meets sassy, fiery mountain biker Allie and her pal Joe, and they become fast friends united by the joy of tackling scenic trails. Sadie starts training for a bike race, but things come to a halt when the trio discover a priest lying in the woods, badly beaten and near death. Then Allie disappears and Sadie finds herself racing to trace her and uncover what is happening around them.
Thirteen years after its original release in 2011, this coming-of-age thriller about courage and conquering rough terrain on two wheels has a new edition out this summer. A short film scripted by Fjelland Davis was directed by Steph Borklund in 2017.
This article first appeared on July 22, 2024 in The Edge Malaysia.
