Emily Maye was in a fantasy cycling league before she really fell in love with the sport. (Yes, there is such a thing, just like in football.) But at Stage 13 of the 2009 Tour de France it hit her. Heinrich Haussler had won the stage in a downpour and as he crossed the finish line he put his hands over his face in a show of emotion. She was hooked.

Most people had never heard of Haussler, but because of the league that she was in with her dad and his friends, Maye was paying attention. She knew Haussler usually served as leadout man for Thor Hushovd and that it was his first career Tour de France stage win. He was four minutes in front of the next rider and had been in the lead for 195 grueling kilometers (video below).

"It was quite a romantic visual," says Maye, who is based in Los Angeles. "He was not going to be a contender [in the overall tour] but to him that stage was the culmination of everything he had worked for."

At that same time, Maye had also become enamored with old bicycle racing photos like those made by Robert Capa at the 1939 Tour de France. She loved the timeless feel of the pictures — the way Capa captured the atmosphere of the event instead of just the action — and wanted to find a way to recreate that approach.

Her first chance came when she secured a press pass by herself to the 2011 Tour of California and shot four stages. With Capa and others floating around in the back of her head, she did what he did and mostly ignored the obvious action and turned her camera on the behind-the-scenes and in-between moments–sometimes simply making graphical observations.

"I wanted to show people something they wouldn't be able to see by just freeze-framing the TV footage," she says.

It was a risk. She often worried that she had strayed too far from the mainstream bike photography images. But back home, scanning through the work, it was clear she'd made the right decision.

One photo in particular stood out. It was a photo of a post-race and shirtless Tejay van Garderen, who at the time was relatively unknown, but is now a rising star having just won the best young rider White Jersey at the 2012 Tour de France. In the photo van Garderen stands exhausted, showing a stark farmer tan. It's a quiet moment, but revealing–a window into how much these races leave a mark, literally, on the riders' bodies.

"I was particularly drawn to the look on his face, it seemed so inwardly reflective," Maye says. "He's almost in a trance."

For the last year and a half Maye has been pumping out incredible work, with both editorial and commercial clients latching onto her distinct style. Over that time she's continued to push the envelope of how she sees, giving her audience a creative look at a sport that many of us know nothing about.

Maye has been rewarded with a few dream assignments, like a commercial shoot on Spain's Mallorca island of Team Sky wearing Rapha gear. (For the uninitiated, Rapha is like the Gucci of bike gear, and Team Sky is the most important road-racing team in the world right now because their rider, Bradley Wiggins, won the 2012 Tour de France.)

Before Mallorca she had been in Portugal on a shoot for Specialized, another huge brand.

"It's been a wonderful year and a half since I started," she says. "I wouldn't have imagined that it would go this way."

Maye says she's obviously aware of the black cloud of drugs hanging over cycling at the moment so she's trying to take the long view in her work. She doesn't deny drugs are a problem, but also argues that it's a big sport and there are still plenty of people out there working hard to move cycling forward.

"There is more to the sport than doping," she says.

Next Maye plans to get embedded with a road-racing team for one of the major races. She wants to have access to everything—from breakfast, to pillow time—but knows that's a tall order because the teams are notoriously private.

"That would be the ultimate, ultimate," she says.

Stage 13 - Recap - 200 km - Vittel to Colmar -... by broadbandsports