Chasing Legends is a chronicle of Team Columbia HTC’s ’09 Tour de France, with the history of the Tour intermingled via archival footage and sepia toned recreations. Phil Liggett serves as both narrator and talking head, along with Eddy Merckx and Paul Sherwen. Columbia riders and staff move the story along in interviews, and Jens Voigt is thrown in to add his special brand of suffer-talk that makes bike nerds’ hearts go all aflutter.

The footage is breathtaking, with the race seen from the usual perspectives as well as other angles like team car cam, soigneur cam and photographer cam. One gets the sense of the grand sweep of the Tour in the mountains on one hand, and the sheer claustrophobia of a TTT on a bike path on the other.

Much of the film follows the familiar narrative of so many cycling films: the Tour is really hard, riders suffer immensely, descents are terrifying, soigneurs work all day, mechanics work even longer days, and everything is epic epic epic. I found the lighter side more illuminating: the humor in team meetings, the Frick and Frack interplay of DS Brian Holm and manager Rolf Aldag, Zabel happily washing a bike, Menchov crashing and crashing.

As this is Columbia’s story, it’s told from their perspective, with Garmin cast as faceless villains. ‘Chasegate’ is (probably rightfully) related as Garmin spitefully keeping Hincapie out of yellow, but with no mention made of the taunting team owner Bob Stapleton delivered that might’ve motivated it. Cavendish’s relegation on the same stage is blamed on Hushovd taking a bad line. Liggett and Sherwen, ever the yes men, hew faithfully to the Columbia party line.

Oddly enough, while Contador and Schleck are barely in evidence, Armstrong gets plenty of screen time. Armstrong bridging to Contador and Schleck on stage 16 gets the full Liggett and Sherwen breathless commentary and heroic soundtrack treatment, as if he had won the Tour instead of merely rejoining a group up the road. It’s unfortunate that a film on Columbia still needs to pay lip service to Armstrong, especially considering that Columbia kicked so much ass there was no shortage of material.

Columbia had a terrific race in ’09, with Cavendish winning 6 stages and Tony Martin doing a stint in the white jersey. The film is at its best when it documents the team’s successes. We get the inside story of the crosswind split on stage 3, Holm ordering the riders to ‘eat shit’ during a leadout, Hincapie sweating out and ultimately denying a broken collarbone, and Renshaw’s masterful swamping of Garmin on the Champs. These insider moments will appeal most to the racer crowd.

So is the movie a ‘must see’? You’re an compulsive participant in a fringe sport. Of course you’re going to see it. You can order the DVD, and there’ll be a screening at Symphony Space on 9/30. Check back here for some ticket giveaways to the screening.