Wiggins talks about his Tour de France failure

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Team Sky's marquee man Bradley Wiggins.(Image credit: Jesse Wild)

Bradley Wiggins has revealed that the death of his grandfather a week after the Tour de France marked a turning point in his season and perhaps even his career, when he stopped wallowing in self-pity, threw off the air of pompousness he had been using as a protective shield since signing with Team Sky, and began accepting why he performed so poorly at the Tour.

"I ended up in Hampstead for two weeks after the Tour, visiting a hospital every day, before my granddad died. But he was more than my granddad. He was like my father. He brought me up when Garry left," he said. "It made me realise there are many more important things than how I felt on the Tour – but it was also confusing. I'm not the most emotional person and I found it difficult to come to terms with his death. I find it hard to express grief. The way I tried to do it was by throwing myself into cycling – which meant [his wife] Cath didn't get me back for even longer."

Before riding back down the mountain, Wiggins revealed his real emotions to the press for the first time. For most of the race he had tried to protect himself with a barrier, higher and more protective than the one Team Sky used to shield their riders as they warmed up for time trials. He threw in the towel on his Tour de France hopes that day but also lifted a huge weight of pressure and expectation from his own shoulders.

Looking back at that moment, Wiggins told the Guardian: "At that point I felt on my own because the team bus was at the bottom of the mountain. There was no PR person to protect me but I thought: 'I'm not going to lie. I'm not going to hide behind smoke and mirrors.' I talked like I was talking to my family. Not many sportsmen do that. I showed everyone I was vulnerable and, in the end, people respect that more."

"You think it's the end of the world and you're completely alone in the whole saga but it's just sport. Sometimes it doesn't go to plan and things go wrong. Success is easy to take for granted. You look back at the Olympics and think: 'Oh, when I won that individual pursuit gold [in 2008] it was easy.' You forget the toll it takes and the hard work it needs. It's only when you lose that you realise how bloody hard it is. But it brings you down to earth with a thud and makes you concentrate on next year. That's the great thing about the Tour. There's always next year and the chance to rectify everything."

“I ended up up my own arse a little – and it was so far from the truth it was unreal. I didn't do that a year before." More damagingly, Wiggins and Sky decided he should compete in the Giro d'Italia: "It felt like I'd spent all my tokens before the Tour. I took it easy in the 2009 Giro and the weather was fantastic and the course was nowhere near as severe. This year we pushed hard and I was seventh with a week to go – but, eventually, we broke. I then got sick and the Tour started disastrously."

"Widening the focus will help. I remember coming back from the national road race in 2009 and, a week before the Tour, we stopped at a service station. I had a pizza and a couple of beers. This year I wouldn't have a little glass of wine in case it ruined my Tour. But a more relaxed Brad, after a glass of wine, would've had a much better Tour. When you look back it seems so simple and you think: 'What a dick!' I've learned my lesson."

Stephen is the most experienced member of the Cyclingnews team, having reported on professional cycling since 1994. He has been Head of News at Cyclingnews since 2022, before which he held the position of European editor since 2012 and previously worked for Reuters, Shift Active Media, and CyclingWeekly, among other publications.