by John Deering
PR guru Max Clifford waded in to ensure himself some column inches by trying to assess Brad’s financial worth. ‘It’s an amazing achievement and of course it’s a great story, with his dad and all that went before. It’s a real triumph out of real tragedy, and we love those kind of stories. The whole of Europe is at his feet. In the next couple of years we are talking £10 million or £20 million.’
Brad would be interested to read that, especially after his first brush with success earned him no more than a £35,000 contract to ride a bike for a year. He’d be sure to work a little bit harder to turn this one into a drop of cold hard cash for his family.
The Independent declared Bradley ‘King of France’ and noted that ‘what is totally new, also, was to see a triple Olympic track champion win the Tour de France.’
The Star looked for a way to link the win with the Olympics that were starting in less than a week. ‘Olympic chiefs were last night urged to let British Tour de France hero Bradley Wiggins light the opening ceremony cauldron. His incredible victory has sparked calls for him to be awarded a knighthood and made BBC Sports Personality of the Year. And fans demanded he be given the honour of firing up the Olympic cauldron at Friday’s opening ceremony.’
Bradley himself is circumspect and relaxed. He’s had a long time to think about this. ‘Going back as a child, watching the Tour on telly from the age of ten, eleven, twelve, all through the Indurain years, dreaming that one day you would win the Tour,’ he said at a news conference, ‘but you never really think it’s possible. What chance does a kid growing up in central London ever have to win the Tour?
‘I’m determined to not let it change me,’ he went on. ‘I’m not into celebrity life or all that rubbish. So much of British culture is built around people who are famous for doing nothing. I’m still Bradley Wiggins. At the end of the day, I have to go home and clean up dog muck. At the end of the day, it’s just sport. There will be more Tour winners in the future.’
STAGE 20:
Rambouillet–Paris, 120km
Sunday, 22 July 2012
‘There is a set of railings, about six or eight of them, just before the entrance to the Place de la Concorde, about a kilometre from the Tour de France finish on the Champs-Élysées. I stood on those railings with my brother and my mum on 25 July 1993 watching the Tour de France go past.’
One might think that Great Britain’s history, or lack of history, at this venerable old race might mean a lack of understanding of what it means: the cultural weight, the social power of the Tour de France. A country raised on dashed footballing hopes, Wimbledon near-misses, some Olympic achievements and the odd cricketing or rugby success would surely have no place in its hearts for a French national celebration?
As Bradley Wiggins so beautifully evokes in his Guardian column, the Tour de France means a great deal to a lot of British people. Football stadiums may be full with multitudes paying the wages of the super-rich every weekend. Millions of satellite dishes zing with the pictures beamed in from the MCG or Newlands or even Trent Bridge. Twickenham resounds not just to the roar of those inside when Chris Ashton swallow-dives over for a try, but thousands of pubs across the land. And the boundaries of Henman Hill can be redrawn to encompass the outline of this sceptred isle when Andy Murray is on Centre Court. But for more of us than most would guess, the Champs-Élysées is where our sporting hearts lie.
And it looks as though every single one of us is in Paris today.
Just like Brad, brother Ryan and mum Linda in 1993, British cycling fans have hopped on the Eurostar, driven down to the Chunnel, used up their Sun ferry vouchers or jetted out of Stansted to watch the arrival of the Tour on to the neat cobbles of downtown Paris. Only there’s a few more now than when they were here.
The circuit around the Champs-Élysées and the Place de la Concorde is about 7km. Let’s say that there is room for three people along every metre of barrier along that course. Just for fun, let’s pluck a number out of the air and assume that the crowd is an average of six deep. We won’t try to count the people in grandstands or hospitality areas or hanging out of hotel windows, just like we won’t take into account the crowd-free bit through the tunnel. I make that, at a conservative estimate, about 126,000 people on the barriers. Another rough guess based purely on the draped Union Jacks, mod target T-shirts and fake sideburns would make about a third of them British. There must be a lot of Sunday drivers in the shires thinking, ‘Where the hell are all the cyclists today?’
The Tour de France may be won for Bradley Wiggins and Team Sky, but there’s still work to be done. One man has won this traditional closing stage for the last three years straight, and he’d sincerely like to make it four. His name is Mark Cavendish.
He has been able to call upon the full might of HTC or its various incarnations to lead him to those three emphatic victories, something he has acknowledged has not always been possible this year at Team Sky. Today though, there is no doubt that the entire machine will be placed at his disposal as Brailsford’s boys look to end their dream race in style.
The dead corner under the Arc de Triomphe where the bunch turns back on itself to race back down the other side of the famous old boulevard ought to be renamed Hyde Park Corner for the afternoon, such is the depth and volume of the British support. Though the roars of approval are huge around the whole lap, the British riders glance up with a grin on the far side of the turn at the sheer amusement of the situation.
Nobody ever seems to win on the Champs-Élysées from a breakaway, but that doesn’t stop some optimistic types from trying their luck, even if it gives them nothing more than an opportunity to show the folks back home that they’re still in the race. Jens Voigt, the perennial evergreen chancer, is one of the more successful optimists and has even pulled off the odd win here and there over his fascinating nineteen-year top-level career, a couple of stages in this old race among them. If anybody can pull it off, it’s him, and he’s still in front of the charging bunch when they hear the bell that tells them there is only one of the eight laps of the finishing circuit remaining.
When sprinters want to win, it’s hard to deny them. Team Sky are lining it out and they’ve got assistance from Sagan’s Liquigas-Cannondale, Goss’s Orica-GreenEDGE, Farrar’s Garmin-Sharp and Greipel’s Lotto Belisol. Voigt is captured honourably with 3km remaining and then it’s flat out to the line.
There is the usual battling for pole position, universally presumed to be Cavendish’s wheel. The World Champion is glued to his last lead-out man, Edvald Boasson Hagen, the Norwegian having blossomed into the role over the course of this race. What they really need is somebody blessed with a world-class pursuiter or time triallist’s talent to tow them into the final few hundred metres. Where on earth would they find somebody like that?
In 1993, when Brad, Ryan and their mum were here as spectators, it was to see their hero Miguel Indurain win his third straight Tour. They craned their necks to see the big man in the yellow jersey buried deep in the heart of the bunch, safe in the knowledge that his race was won and he could relax in the bosom of his comrades until the final podium presentation later that afternoon.
The people who’ve journeyed across, over or under la Manche to see their own hero nineteen years later are luckier. They not only get to see the first British winner of the Tour de France, they get to see him lead the whole race under the final flamme rouge of the 2012 race. Wiggins is at full gas, the entire race struggling to hold the wheel of the yellow jersey, riding a newly liveried yellow Pinarello just for the occasion. When he pulls over as the peloton approaches the final elbow, Boasson Hagen takes up his pace and the Manx Missile readies himself. With a breathtaking blast of pure human muscle power Mark Cavendish hits the front waaaaay before anybody else would dream of doing. His initial rush is so great that it opens up a huge gap over Goss and Sagan. The game is up before there are even 200m left to go.
Of all the myriad eulogies and tributes that will pour in for the various achievem
ents we have witnessed today, few will strike a more ringing chord than US star Taylor Phinney’s tweet: ‘Well, that was one of the coolest things I have ever seen.’
Team Sky have taken first and second place in the Tour de France. They have also won six stages. They are entitled to party. Amongst the clamouring hordes around his feet, Bradley Wiggins climbs on to the roof of a team car to accept the adulation.
On the podium, he is more sombre. Despite being a trailblazer, there is none of the bluster of the young Armstrong about Wiggins. He has lived and breathed cycling since he was a boy, watched others go through this magical ritual dozens of times since then. The profundity of the Champs-Élysées podium ceremony is not lost on him. The completeness of his victory has been clear for a few days now – only two men have finished within ten minutes of him and one of them is his teammate – and he has had time to consider the weight of this moment. Unlike a dazed footballer who finds himself with the FA Cup above his head minutes after a late winning goal at Wembley, Brad has coasted into Paris with the praise of the race, the press and the world ringing in his ears and resounding in his head.
The sportswriter Richard Williams dismisses the inevitable comparisons with Great British greats like Fred Perry and Bobby Moore, instead alighting on a more suitable match in Mike Hawthorne. When he became the UK’s first motor racing World Champion in 1958, Hawthorne broke a long tradition of Italians, Argentinians and French winners, opening the door for the proud list of British winners that have followed. Perhaps, muses Williams, that will be Wiggins’s true legacy.
His humour, his humility, his honesty, his confidence and his talent have made Brad a popular winner of this race, despite France’s natural antipathy for les rosbifs. A great cartoon in L’Équipe shows the yellow jersey’s aquiline profile and sizeable sideburn, with the face furniture neatly shaped into a map of France.
Finally, the presentations complete, the obligatory shots of the winner looking wistfully over to the Arc de Triomphe in the can, Wiggins moves towards his public to say a few words. He has been planning these lines for some time, certainly the last few days, possibly the last couple of years, or even his whole life. He takes a deep breath and a hush falls as the gathered masses wait to hear exactly what it all means to this remarkable young man.
‘Right,’ he begins, ‘we’re going to draw the numbers for the raffle now.’
EPILOGUE:
Hampton Court
Wednesday, 1 August 2012
There aren’t many people who’ve been to more bike races than Graham Watson. The world’s best known cycling photographer covered his first Tour de France in 1977 and has been on the road pretty much uninterrupted since then. With his trusty companion and motorcycle pilot, former Cycle Sport editor Luke Evans, he sits enjoying what is probably his ten millionth pre-race coffee in a café near the start of a bike race.
But today is slightly different. For the first time in that long illustrious history of capturing bike races, Graham could have walked to the start from his front door. It’s not even a long walk; it’s the sort of walk you might take for a pint of milk or the Sunday papers. Because today the world is coming to Graham’s front door. This is Hampton Court, this is London 2012, and this is the Olympic Time Trial. Even cycling photography’s most impassive proponent is excited. Not excited like you or me, you understand, but excited. A little bit.
Graham has been photographing Bradley Wiggins since the late 1990s, but never more so than in 2012, and that’s not a record that’s about to end today.
Outside Henry VIII’s front door, another Olympian is rubbing the sweat off his palms. Former GB Road Champion Matt Stephens was a competitor at Barcelona twenty years ago. Today his crucial Olympic role is to push off the riders as they sail down the start ramp to begin the 44km that separates them from golden glory.
Spain’s time trial specialist Luis Leon Sanchez barely makes it off the ramp. A broken chain means his day is dead before it’s begun. Oh, and Sanchez will get a puncture before his ride is over, too. Just how many black cats did he run over on his way here?
Brad is sandwiched between his twin nemeses. World Champion Tony Martin precedes him, and breathing down his neck in the start house is the reigning Olympic Champion Fabian Cancellara.
If there has ever been a crowd like this at a time trial before, it went unrecorded. Every yard of the course is covered with spectators. They were lining the barriers at 8.30 this morning, with Wiggins not scheduled to start until 3.07 p.m. Over six hours of waiting in the sun in stick-on ginger sideburns, peering at the world through the eyeholes in their Wiggins masks, handily supplied in this morning’s tabloids for instant use. It’s not an unknowledgeable crowd either. Armed with start sheets, a murmur goes along the barriers as the cognoscenti discuss the next rider as he approaches. Along Hampton Court Way, 10km in, the iPhone timers are out in force, calculations based on the 90-second gap between riders constantly whirring. Who’s winning? The seeding is working out well enough for the answer to usually be: the next guy.
A rumble of anticipation sweeps up the road about ten seconds in advance of each competitor. When Jack Bauer of New Zealand flies around the corner that brings him into view a gasp precedes him as his fine margins nearly take him straight into the barriers.
Any notion that this is an ill-informed mob is lost when Vinokourov pounds past. The freshly crowned Olympic Road Champion’s mixed history is obviously well known to this audience and he travels through to the sound of muted applause and scattered boos in stark contrast to the enthusiastic welcome afforded to everybody else so far.
A massive roar from the direction of the River Thames tells us that Chris Froome is on his way. The British love to adopt a winner. It’s even better if he becomes a winner after they’ve adopted him, so Chris Froome is greeted like the homecoming hero he is. One of only two British riders in history to step on to the final GC podium in Paris, it’s probably reasonable to expect his reception will be eclipsed by the other one when he arrives in a few minutes’ time, but it’s hard to imagine this lot getting any more excited than they are at seeing the Kenyan-born climber in the flesh. He sails through on a tide of noise, the fastest so far.
Tony Martin is on his way now. The cycling fans hold their breath as they await the German, knowing a true challenger to their man has arrived. The other spectators chuckle to themselves, remembering that Tony Martin was the name of the Norfolk farmer who took a shotgun to a pair of burglars and found himself a cause célèbre a few years ago. Martin is certainly giving it both barrels and comes through the corridor of noise like the proverbial speeding bullet. Fastest.
In some ways, there could be no more pressure on Brad. Those not familiar with the tangled intricacies of road racing were left entirely bemused by Mark Cavendish’s failure to top the charts on The Mall at the weekend. ‘Seven years he had to prepare for that and he comes nowhere,’ was not a unique reaction amongst armchair sports fans over their newspapers on Sunday morning. Scandalously, that view was even shared by some ill-informed hacks filling their pages. Cav’s adoption by the Great British public to become BBC Sports Personality of the Year is not enough alone to earn him exemption from national expectancy. Now that weight has passed to the skinny shoulders of Wiggins. These Games are now into their fifth day and this city is baying for British gold.
On the other hand, what the hell? This annus mirabilis is in the bag. Paris–Nice led to the Tour de Romandie and on to the Dauphiné and up to the Tour de France with scarcely a misplaced turn of the pedals among them. Unbeaten in long time trials despite Martin and Cancellara’s best efforts, who cares about a little local affair that carries more weight with the great unwashed than the true devotees who travelled to the Champs-Elysées to celebrate the arrival of Golden Sideburns the weekend before last?
Here comes the answer. The red aero helmet is perfectly still, the spine of the GB skinsuit entirely flat, the pedal stroke impeccably even, the speed perceptibly fast. Powered by noise,
the sound of his carbon disc wheel drowned out by a thousand hollering Wiggo-lovers, he heads to the first time check and a narrow lead over Martin.
Only Spartacus remains. The great man has passed himself fit after inexplicably flying head first into the barriers outside the Star and Garter home for military veterans in Richmond Park during Saturday’s road race. Destined to be known by thousands of southwest London cyclists as Cancellara Corner forever more, the deceptively innocuous curve had caused a miscalculation in the defending Olympic TT Champion as he looked behind to discover the whereabouts of the chasing bunch at exactly the wrong moment. Right arm dangling loosely at his side after a hefty thwack on the shoulder, he ploughed on to the finish in central London, when a quick pedal back to the Swiss hotel at Hampton Court might have been a better plan. X-rays showed no structural damage, but deep bruising and intense discomfort put his participation in the time trial in serious doubt. Would he be able to hold his aero position for 44km? Would he lose some of his legendary power? With Wiggins in the form of his life and a sound beating of the Swiss icon in the bag at Besançon just a couple of weeks ago, surely Cancellara would need to be at 100% to retain his crown.
Frankly, despite the welcome from a crowd delighted to see the world’s most popular cyclist on their own turf, it’s clear that this is unlikely to be Cancellara’s day. Rocking slightly as he tries to find some comfort, it’s clear that he’s not going to be able to stay within the 90 seconds of Wiggins that he needs to get on the podium.
The Tour de France Champion, three times an Olympic Champion, Bradley Wiggins OBE, unbeaten in long time trials in 2012, on home roads. He’s not going to lose today, is he?