Showing results by publisher "Audible Studios" in Sports

Telling the remarkable tale of a man who is still remembered on the streets of New Orleans and in the hearts of professional-wrestling fans, this book aims to restore the overlooked Junkyard Dog to his proper place in the history books. In 1979, Sylvester Ritter, also known as the Junkyard Dog, managed to break one of the final color barriers in the sport by becoming the first Black wrestler named undisputed top star of his promotion, and this biography reveals all the famous feuds and business back stories that made him a wrestling legend.

No man has affected more runners in more ways than Bill Bowerman. During his 24-year tenure as track coach at the University of Oregon, he won four national team titles and his athletes set 13 world and 22 American records. He also ignited the jogging boom, invented the waffle-sole running shoe that helped establish Nike, and coached the US track and field team at the 1972 Munich Olympic Games.

When blue-blooded, storklike Samuel Wilson Fussell arrived in New York City fresh from the University of Oxford, the ethereal young graduate seemed like the last person on Earth who would be interested in bodybuilding. But he was intimidated by the dangers of the city and decided to do something about it. At 26, Fussell walked into the YMCA gym. Four solid years of intensive training, protein powders, and steroid injections later, he had gained 80 pounds of pure muscle and was competing for bodybuilding titles.

Mind Games follows the journey of Phil Jackson to the top of basketball’s coaching hierarchy, a rise that took him from obscurity in the Continental Basketball Association to nine championship rings in the NBA. Along the way he turned multimillionaire players on to meditation, transformed the Michael Jordan-led Chicago Bulls from a one-man show to a five-man team of domination, and after battling with Bulls management, ended one dynasty to start another on the West Coast.

Glenn McGrath is an Australian cricket great - a fast bowler both feared and admired by top-level cricketers around the world. Off the field, his life was touched by tragedy with the death of his first wife, Jane, from breast cancer yet also marked by a determination to celebrate her life and make sure her legacy helps thousands of others through the Jane McGrath Foundation - now one of Australia's biggest and most effective breast cancer charities

The first-ever authorized biography of Jeff Gordon, the four-time champion racing legend. For over a year, Garner interviewed and observed Gordon at races, at special events, and at home. The book is based on extensive interviews with Gordon - as well as in-depth interviews with dozens of family members, friends, competitors, and colleagues, some of whom have never gone on the record before.

Martí Perarnau was given total access to Bayern Munich during season 2013-14. This audiobook represents the first time in the modern era that a writer has got this close to one of the elite teams of world football. At the invitation of Pep Guardiola, he shadowed the Catalan, his staff and his superstar players during training and on matchdays. Bayern smashed domestic records on their way to the double, but were humiliated by Real Madrid in the Champions League semi-final.

No driver has ever made such an instant impact on the sport of F1 racing as Lewis Hamilton. The first black grand prix driver, his astonishing level of success in his rookie season together with his swash-buckling, attacking style has created a sensation. It has also been a central factor in the most exciting and controversial season of F1 in living memory as Hamilton was involved in a three-way fight for the world crown.

Dedicated to the memory of two wrestling coaches and two writer friends, The Imaginary Girlfriend is John Irving's candid memoir of his twin careers in writing and wrestling. The award-winning author of best-selling novels from The World According to Garp to In One Person, Irving began writing when he was 14, the same age at which he began to wrestle at Exeter. He competed as a wrestler for 20 years, was certified as a referee at 24, and coached the sport until he was 47.

There has been much said about Dusty Rhodes, the 'American Dream', over the years by both his fans and peers. Aside from the frequent fictional prose penned by wrestling magazine journalists and internet smart marks that run rumor-mill websites, however, there has not been much written about him. Until now. With the exception of a select few, there has been no bigger name or personality in the annals of pro wrestling history than Dusty Rhodes.

Andrea Pirlo is one of the finest footballers of his generation - a World Cup and Champions League winning playmaker who has redefined his position at the base of midfield, and one of the most deadly free-kick takers the game has known. This is his story, in his words. It is written with a level of humour and insight which confound his image as a dead-eyed assassin on the field of play.

The forthright, fascinating memoir of Peter Moody, trainer of Black Caviar and one of Australia's most high-profile and best-liked racing identities. The classic story of a boy from the bush who worked his way from outback Queensland all the way to Royal Ascot. As a kid growing up in tiny Wyandra, Peter Moody learned to ride almost before he could walk. Horses were part of life, and as a teenager working for local trainers he learned many lessons - some of them painful - as he built his understanding of them. A mate's introduction got him a stablehand's job for the legendary trainer Tommy Smith in Sydney, and his life changed forever.

It’s hard enough coming out, but playing basketball for a nationally ranked school and trying to figure out your sexual identity in the closeted and paranoid world of big-time college sports - that’s a challenge. Kate Fagan’s love for basketball and for her religious teammates at the University of Colorado was tested by the gut-wrenching realization that she could no longer ignore the feelings of otherness inside her. In trying to blend in, Kate had created a hilariously incongruous world for herself in Boulder.

In Surviving the Shark, Jonathan Kathrein describes his incredible shark attack experience. The book covers all aspects of Kathrein’s survival, beginning with the eerie moments just before the attack, when something smashes into Kathrein’s hand as he paddles on his board, waiting for a wave off Stinson Beach in northern California. Realizing it is probably shark, and possibly a great white, Kathrein tries to paddle away, furiously trying to make it toward shore, where he sees some of his friends on the beach.

In 2012, Hakeem al-Araibi was a promising young player on Bahrain's national football team when he was arrested for attacking a police station during the Arab Spring, despite television footage showing him playing soccer at the time of the alleged attack. After three months of torture and wrongful imprisonment, Hakeem was released. He fled the country and made his way to Australia, where he was granted refugee status. Hakeem made a life here and was playing for the suburban Pascoe Vale Football Club, in Melbourne. He thought he was safe.

Learn about these golf legends as they were learning to master the game on their home turf. In Grown at Glen Garden, the early friendship of Ben Hogan and Byron Nelson is shown, from their caddying days at Glen Garden Country Club to their chummy rivalry at the Masters decades later. With a peek at their family backgrounds, the story shows both the hardships and joys of growing up and learning to golf in Fort Worth, Texas, in the 1920s.

Mark Twight is a BANFF award-winner, an extreme climber, an extreme writer, and an extreme personality. No matter what he's doing, Mark Twight takes a definite, and often controversial , stand. Anyone who knows climbing knows Twight's name, and anyone who knows Twight's name will want to listen to this audiobook. Each story is told in Twight's taut, in-your-face style. Brand-new epilogues bring each piece full circle, providing updated information and fresh, hindsight perspectives.

In this searing and riveting New York Times best seller, Olympic gold medalist Dominique Moceanu reveals the dark underbelly of Olympic gymnastics, the true price of success…and the shocking secret about her past and her family that she only learned years later.

In 2005, Martine Wright was a marketing manager for a web company, focused on her career. In 2015 she was voted one of the '50 Most Powerful Women in British Sport' by The Independent. In between those dates, her life changed forever when she lost both of her legs in the London tube bombings of 7/7. She was, in fact, the last person to be brought out alive from the atrocities. She lost 80 per cent of her blood, was in a coma for 10 days and underwent 10 months of surgery.

It may have been because she could run. It may have been because she wanted to swim, or perhaps because she only ever did 10 minutes of breaststroke at a time. But, as she learned one day while flailing around in the sea, she really couldn't. Believing that a life lived fully isn't one with the most money earned, the most stuff bought or the most races won but one with the most experiences experienced the most fully, she decided to conquer her fear of the water.