Accepting that he and Team Sky got things wrong this year in relation to the Tour de France, Bradley Wiggins believes that adopting a different approach to next year’s race could increase his chances of returning to the role of a contender in the event.
The Briton was an unexpected fourth in the 2009 Tour, but was only able to place 24th this year after his form deserted him in the race.
The team has said that it will no longer focus everything on the Tour in 2011, but will rather target more races and try to ensure that more riders are in winning form. For Wiggins, this makes sense in a method of taking the pressure off and ensuring that he can go about preparing for the Tour in a more low-key way.
“I think it's just Dave [Brailsford, team manager] taking the heat off me. The whole Sky concept of 'We're going to win the Tour in five years and Brad's our man to do it' has been toned down,” he told the Guardian. “There are lots of races and we've got a team that can win so much on the calendar. We're still going to do everything possible to do well on the Tour, but we're not going to have the weight of expectation that one race, one performance, defines our whole year. We could also win Paris-Roubaix [a one-day road classic].
“Widening the focus will help. I remember coming back from the national road race [championships] 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.”
Wiggins is known for being a straight talker, and doesn’t spare himself from criticism. “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,” he said, suggesting that he and the team were “too pompous.”
He believes that part of the reason was to do with the sudden success of the year before. “A lot had to do with hype and expectation. I signed for the team and we had that press conference where, bang, the question came: 'Are you ready to win the Tour?' In 2009 I'd said: 'I think I can go top 20' and a press conference laughed at me. I went from that to people asking me if I could win.”
Looking back, he believes that he got his build-up wrong for the race. He rode the Giro d’Italia, as he did in 2009, but pushed harder in the race and also was more depleted by the route. “It felt like I'd spent all my tokens before the Tour,” he admitted, talking about the fatigue that hit not only him, but also riders such as race winner Ivan Basso. “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.”
Wiggins admits to feeling a lot of self-pity after the race, but said that he was shaken out of that introspection when his grandfather died. He did a lot of work in raising him after his father left. His sudden illness due to a heart attack shook Wiggins, and helped him put things back into perspective.
“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, saying that his passing put things, “into perspective. All of a sudden I stopped wallowing in self-pity.”
Looking forward, Wiggins doesn’t rule out another high finish in the Tour. He said that he doesn’t know what to make of the Alberto Contador situation, describing it as, “weird,” but also accepts that if the Spaniard is not there, that changes things.
“If Contador is not there next year – and there is a high chance he might not – that really opens it up,” he said. “If he hadn't been there in 2009, I would've finished third. And if Lance Armstrong hadn't been there I would've finished second. Carlos Sastre won it [in 2008]. That was probably the only Tour he was ever going to win but he took his chance.”
It’s clear that Wiggins hasn’t ruled himself out of taking yellow some day. He and Team Sky will shy away from the favourite tag in future but, all going to plan, he likes to think that he could quietly return to top form and to once again fight for a top finish in the event. Don’t expect him to make any bold pronouncements beforehand, though; he and the team know now that action, not words, is what counts.