Beryl - WINNER OF THE SUNDAY TIMES SPORTS BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023

The least publicised, least rewarded great woman athlete ever to be disregarded by her own country. * The Times * The subtitle may not even be hyperbolic. Beryl Burton, an almost forgotten amateur cyclist who worked on a rhubarb farm in Yorkshire, was not simply the undisputed ruler of British women's cycling for 25 years, but also broke the men's record in a 12-hour time trial. Jeremy Wilson retrieves an astonishing life. -- Simon Kuper * Financial Times * To my mortification, I had not heard of Beryl Burton, so pretty much all the material in this was new to me. The subtitle - In Search of Britain's Greatest Athlete - is not hyperbolic: Burton dominated cycling, that most unforgiving of sports, in the 1960s, winning world championships on the road and the track, in 1967 setting a record for the 12-hour time trial (277.25 miles!) not beaten by a man for another two years. A phenomenon. -- Robert Crampton * The Times Best Sports Book of the Year 2022 * An incredible story about one of the greatest cyclists of all time * Irish Times * Britain's greatest ever cyclist is given the literary treatment she so richly deserves in Wilson's rigorously researched biography of the complex and enigmatic Beryl Burton. * Waterstones Best Books of 2022 * I simply cannot exaggerate how bloody great this book is and how inspiring Beryl's story is -- Emma Cole * Cyclist * My 97-year-old mother-in-law has no interest in cycling but picked it up from our kitchen table, took it home, and loved it! -- Alastair Campbell The most comprehensive chronicle of its kind * Yorkshire Post * Remarkable -- Ilkley Gazette One of the greatest figures in the history of British sport. -- Matthew Syed The DiMaggio, the Muhammad Ali ... of British cycling. -- Gordon Burn A marvellous book. Gives a real insight into Beryl and the times. For the first time I feel like I really know her and questions have been answered. So wonderfully researched, so many things I didn't know! It really puts her on the roster of legends. -- Maxine Peake Ludicrously ahead of her time. Ruthless, relentless, brilliant, belligerent - and quite possibly the greatest Olympian Britain never had. What a story. -- Alistair Brownlee, author of Relentless: Secrets of the Sporting Elite and double Olympic champion The scale of unsung achievement is awe-inspiring. The finest Olympian we never had -- Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson, 11 times Paralympic champion Jeremy Wilson finds the human heart of a story that gets more extraordinary as a unique athlete recedes into history. Very highly recommended. -- Richard Williams Jeremy Wilson brings alive this extraordinary woman's achievements (and problems, too - she wasn't always the best mother) in this fabulous biography. -- Sports Books of the Year * Daily Mail * I had never realised the longevity and scale of achievement. I'm in awe. -- Dame Katherine Grainger What a story Wilson has uncovered. No one in the history of sport can have worked with quite the self-sacrificing single-mindedness ... a woman of thermonuclear levels of competitiveness -- Jim White * The Oldie * This is not a hagiography, and all the better for it. Wilson brings her personality to life, faults and all. Meticulously researched. Compelling -- Isabel Best, author of Queens of Pain A beacon is a guiding light, or a warning signal... a fire in a high place. Beryl Burton was, and is, all of those things. Her flame burns all the brighter thanks to Jeremy's fine book. -- Carlton Kirby A beautiful book that tells us not just what she did, but who she truly was. -- Michael Hutchinson, author of Faster This is an inspirational story that just had to be told. There are few athletes, male or female, that had the success and longevity of Beryl Burton - but for too long her name and achievements have remained in the shadows. No longer! This fabulous book brings the person and her phenomenal, groundbreaking achievements to light - I could

Jeremy Wilson is the Chief Sports Reporter for the Daily Telegraph. He was voted investigative sports reporter and national journalist of the year for his work on football and dementia. His sports writing was again highly commended in 2021 at both the British Press Awards and the British Journalism Awards. A lifelong club cyclist, he worked previously as a sports journalist for the Guardian.