Given his recent incredible performance at the Tour of California and
his upcoming appearance in the Tour de Suisse (and most likely Le TdF too) it
seems an appropriate time to write a piece on Wiggins.
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| Wiggins in Yellow riding up the Col de Peyresourde on the route to 2012 TdF victory (© Ben O'Meara) |
When you see the level of Wiggin’s form this year it’s
reminiscent of the golden year of 2012, where Wiggins took the first British
Grand tour win and an Olympic gold medal.
This was a tour win described by some critics as scientific and
un-romantic, however it appealed to me due to the methodical, ruthless and
brutal approach demonstrated by Team Sky. Even with the denied Wiggins/ Froome internal
politics and the so called war of the cycling wags on twitter (mainly just
incompetent media reporters believing cycling fans would be interested in this
kind or literary rubbish); it really did change the face of international cycling
in so many ways. For these changes we
have to thank Wiggins & Brailsford and the likes of Ellingsworth and
Kerrison at Team Sky as well as just being grateful for the fact all these pieces came
together at the same time.
On the flipside you’re often given the impression he can be
somewhat un-gracious in defeat, but understandably so given the amount of
sacrifice and effort he puts into a race which can be ruined through no fault
of his own. So this combined with the
view some have that Wiggo himself has seemingly tried to use the media to put a
stake in the ground and make his demands on which races he would ride can give
a hot/ cold appreciation of Wiggins who is still undeniably one of the top ‘versatile’
road cyclists around.
This aside Wiggin’s recent performance in Paris-Roubaix really
did make me sit up and appreciate him again due mainly to the fact he is a big
cycling fan himself; he obviously understood that this classic was a dangerous
race that could wipe the rest of his season; he carried on, raced and got a
decent top ten finish, something Cancellara
himself rubbished just before the race, with the initial goal of writing
himself further into cycling legend. This
was in turn reminiscent of his attempt in 2013 at the Giro, a course far more
suited to the climbing specialists, as proved by Nibali who took the GC early
on.
So all factors considered whatever you feel about Wiggins he
still goes down as one of Great Britain’s greatest ever athletes. An attempt at the recently ratified
UCI hour record, success in another monument would only confirm that - he's already entered the book of cycling legend...........however you may feel about Wiggo ‘the
boy from Wigan’, ‘the mod’ or 'the grumpy loser’!
