Peter Joffre Nye

When I ran across this book it never occurred to me that Champion Spark Plugs had an actual personality behind them, and the story of Albert Champion almost falls into the category of too good to be true. This being the progression of a man who went from bike messenger, to competitive cyclist, to motorcycle pioneer, to being one of the founders of GM, only to suffer the rather sordid demise of dying after an altercation with his wife's lover. In some ways the business aspect of the man's show more life gets a little short-changed, as Nye has a reputation of a sportswriter who has concentrated on covering cycling, and the core of this book is Champion's sporting career. That said, Champion seems to have become a good hands-on technician in his days of working with motorcycles, so one is somewhat reminded of the career of Eddie Rickenbacker; the key difference being that while Rickenbacker was a war hero, Champion skipped to America to further his sporting career when his induction date into the French military loomed. The line between being a dynamic achiever and a self-serving mercenary can be a thin one, and one that Nye really doesn't examine. show less