Accent

Shooting Lance Armstrong

Joe Patronite has the drill down pat: Fly to France and train a lens on a legend named Lance. Patronite, a top professional photographer based in Tucson, has been doing that every July since 1999 - with dramatic and lucrative results. His photos of cycling superstar Lance Armstrong - churning to victory after victory in the Tour de France - have won lavish display in magazines such as Sports Illustrated and Outside. They've also been used in advertising for Trek bicycles, Subaru cars and other products. This month, Patronite is back in France, documenting Armstrong's quest for a seventh straight victory in the 2,241-mile race. The Tour de France began Saturday and continues through July 24. "It's all about hard work and the passion for the picture," says Patronite, 48, who honed his skills as a photographer at the Arizona Daily Star from 1979 to 1984. "Lance is just so off-the-charts good" that he makes an endlessly fascinating photo subject, Patronite says. "He goes out there and he wants to kill everybody. He wants to win. That's why he's won six tours and could win a seventh." If photographing the Tour de France and its alpha rider has become a centerpiece of Patronite's career, it's hardly his whole franchise. Following newspaper stints at the Star and the Dallas Times Herald, he launched a freelance career in 1990 - focusing on sports, travel and adventure topics. He has covered three Summer Olympics, four Super Bowls, more than 350 National Football League games, hockey and other sports. His pictures have appeared in Time magazine, Fortune, National Geographic Traveler, National Geographic Adventure, Runner's World, Bicycling, USA Today, The New York Times and numerous foreign publications. "Joe is at that level now where editors can assign something to him and know they're going to get good photos," says Jack Dykinga, a Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer known for his dramatic images of Western landscapes. Dykinga, a former photo editor at the Arizona Daily Star, hired Patronite to work at the newspaper. "As you get older, you sort of focus in on what you're best at, and cycling was natural for Joe," Dykinga says. "He not only photographs cycling, but he's quite a cyclist in his own right. He knows what he's doing. He's become one of the most expert at that sort of coverage in the United States now." Dykinga notes another reason for Patronite's focus on cycling and Armstrong: "He and Lance Armstrong go way back." Way back to Armstrong's teen years, as it turns out. "When I was working in Dallas in the mid-'80s, there was this 14-year-old punk who was beating up on everybody when it came to bicycling," Patronite recalls. "Everybody knew he was good even then." Patronite says he took his first pictures of Armstrong, now 33, when the racer was 16 or 17. "By the time he was 19, I was taking a lot of pictures of him for magazines," Patronite says. As much of the world knows, Armstrong's promising career was derailed by testicular cancer in 1996. After chemotherapy and a grueling recovery period, he returned to cycling and stunned fans by winning the Tour de France in 1999. Patronite was there - bagging shot after spectacular shot of Armstrong in action. And he has returned to document Armstrong's triumphs in every Tour de France since then. Patronite, a three-time nominee for the Pulitzer Prize in photography, says the Tour de France shoots call for patience, tenacity, inventiveness and a grasp of the complex nature of team bicycle racing. "It's a lot of 16- to 18-hour days," he says. "Because I understand the sport and because I've raced, I can look at the course profile and get a good idea of where to get in position. But even if I'm in a good position, I might get just one crack a day" at photographing Armstrong and other riders. One example of inventiveness, Patronite says, is using detailed maps to find little-known side roads that allow him to "cut the course" after taking one shot and get in position for another. Knowing Armstrong personally has been little help in getting action shots because the racer is completely focused on riding during the Tour de France. Even downtime photos of the champion aren't as easily accessible for Patronite as they once were. "I used to be able to call Lance and say, 'I need to make a picture of you for so and so,' " Patronite says. "But then he became a rock star." That means Armstrong is "tugged everywhere" and insulated from the media by managers and sponsors. "Two years ago, I had a chance to do some pictures of him in a portrait session," Patronite says. "And I got to be on a bike with him for a couple of hours" in a charity ride. "But that level of fame changes a person. People want bits and pieces of you wherever you go." With hundreds of dramatic images of the world's greatest bicyclist in his collection, Patronite has a little nest egg. "If everything goes as planned, there will be a book in all this," he says.