Tony said that Gary was continually getting into fights for the slightest thing, from a security guard pointing out he’d forgotten his track pass to punch-ups in the pub over an accidental bump of elbows. Tony was too useful to him on track, so he was never going to be a target. ‘And I was a big guy too,’ says Tony. ‘He didn’t dare touch me.’ Sadly for Gary, brawling was also the way he lost his life. He died of a head trauma after a fight at a party at Aberdeen in New South Wales. The investigation into his death never produced a conviction.
So it was that Bradley had little contact with his father and was raised by his mum in a council flat in Kilburn. He clearly inherited some pretty good cycling genes from his dad and he says, even now, that he respects him hugely as a cyclist, if not as a parent.
I’ve seen at first hand the warm, humble and shy side of Bradley. He will always do anything for the fans if not for the press. At the 2013 Giro, he was at the height of his fame, having won the Tour de France the year before. We were in Naples and I saw him get out of a taxi. He was walking over to say hello to me and Dan Lloyd when a huge bear of a man grabbed him and began hugging him, saying, ‘Photo, photo.’ There were minders all around trying to get the man to leave Brad alone, but the Tour de France star was compliant. Clearly it was the last thing he felt like doing, but he stood there while this guy started taking selfies with a queue of others forming behind him. Finally, the guy was happy, but before leaving the Tour de France winner in peace, he grabbed his shoulders and began planting huge, wet, sloppy kisses on each of his cheeks.
Said the fan, ‘I respect you so much.’ Mwah, mwah, mwah. ‘So much respect!’
‘Save some for yourself,’ said Brad under his breath as he headed our way, wiping his cheeks.
Me: ‘That fan seemed happy, Brad.’
Brad: ‘It was like havin’ a randy dog on your leg, FFS.’
Dan Lloyd [referring to Brad’s shape ahead of the race]: ‘You look good, Brad.’
Brad: ‘You look like a f--king tourist.’
Dan Lloyd later binned the pink Giro sunglasses of which he’d been, until that moment, so proud.
With Dan wounded and me wary, we didn’t say much more as we walked over a footbridge to a press conference in a castle.
I’ve walked alongside Bradley a few times like this, often in silence out of respect. But also because small talk is useless. Brad doesn’t do small talk. And ‘asking the bleedin’ obvious’ is just not on. Not that there would be a strong reaction if you did; you’d more likely get one of his deadeye looks. Which can feel worse.
Wiggins won the Tour in 2012, the first British man to do so, and he went on to win the gold medal in the Individual Time Trial at the London Olympics 12 days later. It was an amazing double and the very pinnacle of his career. His victory speech at the Tour was classic Brad. After opening with his jokey ‘raffle tickets’ line, he then spoke as a fan of the sport, talking about how much this meant to him and the unreality of it happening to a simple lad from a Kilburn housing estate. This humble man of the people went on to become a VIP, rubbing shoulders with celebrities and rock and roll greats. The contradictions were not lost on Bradley Wiggins himself. He said it was ‘an unreal time’.
He was clearly struggling to come to terms with new goals and ambitions post-Tour. He’d made it clear that his triumph had been a one-off and that he had no intention of producing a series of similar victories, but it left him with a hole in his life. He certainly decided to give himself a pat on the back and embarked on a partying spree in the off season, including smoking the occasional cigarette, which made headlines. To me it seemed like a rebellion against all the rigours he had endured.
Sure enough, after a few weeks of partying and not riding a bike, the weight began to pile on. Belatedly Brad went to the gym to get back into shape. Sadly, he emerged after the close season ‘gym fit’ and muscle-bound; not ‘cycling fit’ at all. He was well beyond even the Peter Sagan mould and simply too heavy to climb; a stark contrast to the previous season.
He was lost without a goal and he needed guiding. The focus had altered at Sky, with Chris Froome now chosen to lead the team into the next Tour de France. Brad duly entered the Giro but was in poor shape. Then, on a horrible, wet, cold day, a fear appeared to descend over him. He looked scared by the horrendous conditions on one of the descents. Everyone was terrified, including me. There followed a series of aquaplane crashes. Bradley pulled over to the side of the road and got off his bike. Sky said that he’d had a respiratory infection, but my reading of it was that he was both off form and pissed off. His team had moved focus to Froome, he wasn’t race-winning fit and the weather was simply the last straw. I think he’d had enough.
It was time to reinvent himself. He initially thought the Monuments would be a good option, potentially Paris–Roubaix, and he did quite well, finishing ninth in 2014. But it was to the track
