Sir Bradley Wiggins
Britain’s coolest cyclist…ok, maybe second-coolest cyclist now that Geraint Thomas has won the yellow jersey stops by in St. David’s Hall this week. Sir Bradley Wiggins talks to Rhys Fisher about success, team dynamics, and his post-retirement future.
What do The Jam, The Who, Dr Feelgood, The Kinks, and The Small Faces have in common? Probably quite a few things – but in this particular instance, they all feature in Sir Bradley Wiggins’ ultimate mod playlist. Mods and knights don’t appear to be a natural marriage, but neither do mutton-chops and lycra – yet Wiggins managed to rock that look with unabashed cool. In a world of vanilla sporting personalities, it was Wiggins’ insistence of marching to the beat of his own drum that brought him an almost cult-like following back in 2012, when he became the first British winner of the Tour de France.
Fast-forward six years and Geraint Thomas’ mirroring of Wiggins’ feat seems to be an obvious start point; something he was undoubtedly expecting the minute he heard the Welsh accent questioning him. Yet there is no irritation or ego on display in discussing Thomas’ achievement. Wiggins speaks rapturously about the Welshman’s triumph; resembling a proud father fondly recounting his child’s last-gasp winner for their local football team. There seems to be a clear affinity between the two cyclists, that was so evidently absent with Wiggins and four-time Tour de France champion, Chris Froome. Wiggins suggests that the parallels drawn between Thomas and himself were due to their “lad next door, local boy” backgrounds – highlighting the hero’s response Thomas received in Cardiff from locals who remembered him as a young up-and-comer.
In discussing the race itself, Wiggins is full of nothing but praise, quipping that Thomas was “never out of breath.” He discusses the moment he first believed that Thomas had a genuine chance of winning the Tour de France: “When he won the two mountain stages, it was clear he was the strongest rider in the race. The only thing that was going to stop him then was team orders.” It is the dynamic between fellow riders that makes team cycling so interesting and unique: other team sports may be littered with star players, but it is always Real Madrid who win the Champions League, not Cristiano Ronaldo.
When asked about the atmosphere within a team when a single member receives so much of the plaudits and attention, Wiggins argued that it’s never been any different. “From the inside you realise that you couldn’t have done it without the team, and you can’t win alone no matter how strong you are.” Wiggins seems set to endear himself even further to Cardiff locals by highlighting Luke Rowe as arguably the most influential member of Team Sky during the Tour: “When you watch it properly like I do, you realise that if it wasn’t for someone like [Cardiff-born] Luke Rowe, Geraint probably wouldn’t have won. Yet whereas Geraint won’t be able to pop down the shop for a pint of milk without being recognised, Luke can probably still walk about Cardiff. So for a lot of the team members they might not even envy someone like Geraint, and all the pressure he has to deal with inside and outside of cycling.”
Wiggins of course, has firsthand experience of the intense pressure of expectation and media scrutiny that accompanies being an elite athlete. Whilst eight Olympic medals and a Tour de France victory seem more than a fair trade-off, he does admit that towards the end of his career he found it a “bit of a chore.” Since retiring, far from struggling to acclimatise to life outside of competing, Wiggins has kept busy through a number of projects and pursuits – ranging from rowing to punditry. “I always knew I wanted to do other things, I wasn’t someone who was going to stay in cycling for the rest of my life for the adulation. I’ve made a documentary for Sky Arts on youth culture, which is going out before the end of the year, and I’ve just brought the book out which traces how I got into the sport – got to get the plug in for the manager.”
Another of Wiggins’ high-profile projects is his own cycling team, Team Wiggins, where he has recently stated his intentions to gain funding for a women’s team. The treatment and portrayal of women’s cycling events was called into question during the Tour de France, with the women’s equivalent – running as a single-day event – being described as a “token gesture” by Kathryn Bertine. Despite having empathy with the situation, Wiggins calls for the necessity for time and patience in establishing the women’s side of the sport. “I think it’s definitely better than it was five years ago, and it’s certainly better than it was 10 years ago, when it was effectively non-existent. It’s a work in progress and it’s getting better and better year-on-year, and more and more household names are starting to come through. If it keeps developing the way it’s developing, there’s no reason it can’t be right up there with the men’s events – but it’s going to take time.”
Despite these other ventures, cycling remains irrevocably Wiggins’ main passion. He speaks candidly and concernedly about the future of British cycling. Although he, Thomas, and Froome have collectively helped themselves to six of the last seven yellow jackets, the domestic British cycling scene is floundering in comparison. In recent months, two stalwarts of British cycling – JLT Condor and Onepro Cycling – have been forced to close, with fears that others could soon follow suit. For Wiggins, this paradoxical situation is down to the buzzword of 2018: Brexit. “A lot of companies don’t know what’s going to happen in the future and this uncertainty is a massive problem. For these financial organisations in particular, the first thing to go when there’s uncertainty is marketing and sponsorship budgets, and sport is going to suffer.”
Bradley Wiggins is the sort of personality who transcends sport. Despite the Olympic medals, Tour de France victory, and knighthood he’s still the same grounded, local boy the nation fell in love with over six years ago – a point accentuated by him starting this conversation with a playful “Hello darling.” If that isn’t enough to persuade you to pop in to St David’s Hall this Saturday – then surely his prediction that Geraint Thomas could win the next four Tour de France races is.
Bradley Wiggins: An Evening With, St. David’s Hall, Sat 17 Nov. Tickets: £34.50. Info: www.stdavidshallcardiff.co.uk