Between the Lines, by Victoria Pendleton: New autobiography will reveal Victoria's secrets

TRENDING...Olympic Gold

Team GB's Olympic gold rush will have spin-off benefits for the sports book industry with publishers and retailers eager to give high visibility to any gold medal stories they can push between now and the Christmas sales peak.

Among the first to hit the shelves will be cyclist Victoria Pendleton's autobiography Between the Lines, on which she has been working with Donald McRae, a writer who has twice won the William Hill Sports Book of the Year award.

Due out on September 13 in the United Kingdom, Between the Lines: The Autobiography -- published by HarperSport -- promises to describe in 'searingly honest detail' a career of highs and lows and controversies that has just ended, following Pendleton's decision to retire at the end of London 2012.

It was a victorious finale for Pendleton, who failed to retain the track cycling sprint crown she won in the velodrome in Beijing but did claim her second Olympic gold in the keirin.

Yet a career that also brought her nine World championship wins as well as Commonwealth and European titles did not always run smooth.  She found herself at the centre of controversy when she revealed she was in a relationship with her coach, Scott Gardner, and more than once wanted to quit the sport as physical and mental pressures took their toll.

Donald McRae, whose interviews in the Guardian have become required reading, was part of that newspaper's team at London 2012.  He won the William Hill prize in 1996 for his book about boxing, Dark Trade, and in 2002 for Black and White: The Untold Story of Joe Louis and Jesse Owens.

Pre-order Between the Lines: The Autobiography (HarperSport)

In the meantime...

Sir Chris Hoy's story will need an update but the journey from boyhood to triple Olympic champion in Beijing is covered in Chris Hoy: The Autobiography (HarperSport), while Hoy's rise is at the centre of Richard Moore's excellent study of the track cycling revolution in Great Britain.

In Heroes, Villains and Velodromes (HarperSport), Moore shadowed Hoy for an entire season, in which he gained an unembellished insight into the mind of a World and Olympic champion. He was also afforded unprecedented levels of access to key players behind the scenes in British cycling, including top coaches, psychiatrists and doctors.

More cycling books

Richard Moore is also the author of:

Sky's the Limit: Wiggins and Cavendish -- the Quest to Conquer the Tour de France(HarperSport)

Slaying the Badger: LeMond, Hinault and the Greatest Ever Tour de France (Yellow Jersey)

and In Search of Robert Millar (HarperSport)

as well as

The Dirtiest Race in History: Ben Johnson, Carl Lewis and the Olympic 100m Final(Wisden Sports Writing)

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The Fastest Man Alive: The True Story of Usain Bolt, by Usain Bolt and Shaun Custis: Bolt's plan to run 100m in just 9.4 seconds

TRENDING.... Usain Bolt

Usain Bolt will be nearly 30 by the time the next Olympics come round yet it would be unwise to discount him as a contender for at least the 200-metre gold.  He may be giving four years to Jamaican rivals Yohan Blake and Warren Weir but the 200m is the event he favours most and he could decide to double up the 200m with the 400m.

Amazingly, however, he still thinks he can improve on his 9.58 second world record for 100m, as he explained to Sun journalist Shaun Custis, with whom he has been working on a new autobiography, due out soon.

He tells Custis that his 9.58sec run in the 2009 World Championships in Berlin was a flawed performance on three counts, undermined by a drive phase at the start that was too short and a middle phase in which he was too tight. He also reckoned he did not keep his head still enough.

Bolt's belief is that he could cut a scarcely credible 0.18 seconds off that time and reset the record at 9.4 seconds, although he does not feel it possible for anyone -- himself included -- to go below that mark. "It is impossible to run 9.2," he says. "The body is not made to go that fast no matter how hard you train, no matter how good your technique."

The book is a celebration of Bolt's influences, background, and the continuing upward trajectory of his career. It tells the story of the kid from the Jamaican parish of Trelawny -- home to a host of Olympic athletes -- who grew up playing cricket and soccer before discovering how fast he could run.

Bolt shares stories of his family and friends and the laidback Jamaican culture. He tells of the motivating factors that helped him reach the top and of the dedication and sacrifices behind his showman image.

Look out for: The Fastest Man Alive: The True Story of Usain Bolt (Sports Publishing).

In the meantime...

Why not try an excellent biography of Usain Bolt written by award-winning athletics writer Steven Downes, published ahead of the games by specialist publishers SportsBooks.

Downes was told to keep an eye out for Bolt as long ago as 2003 when the gangly Jamaican won the 200m at the world youth championships in a record time and has followed his career ever since.

It is a fascinating life story that explains how Bolt’s destiny was changed when his time for the 100m at a minor meeting in Crete in 2007 convinced him that the financial rewards being accrued by his compatriot, the then 100m world champion Asafa Powell, could be at his command, too.  Now Bolt is a box office draw like none ever seen.

Usain Bolt: The Story of the World's Fastest Man (SportsBooks).

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