Bradley Wiggins (19 page)

It was of course here in 1967 that the dreams of victory of Britain’s great Tour de France hope, Tom Simpson, faltered along with the great man’s heart. He died on these dry slopes,
wedded for eternity to the cause. His famous last words echo down across the decades. ‘Put me back on my bike,’ he demanded after his first collapse on those fatal slopes. Minutes
later, he was gone forever, but he will never, ever be forgotten.

Tom Simpson died for many reasons: exhaustion, the heat, amphetamines, brandy . . . Any number of factors can be brought up as the cause of his demise, but anybody who has suffered on a bicycle
will appreciate that the true reason Tom Simpson died was that his will was stronger than his body. Most of us know when it’s time to give up. Our body tells us that we can’t do it any
more. Stop, get off, wait, walk, or just slow down a bit, it may sound ‘soft’ but ultimately it’s just common sense. The ability to ignore those sensible warnings is what sets
great champions apart from good athletes. Tom Simpson was the best there has ever been at bearing that pain, and he paid for it with his life.

The memorial to Tom on the high slopes of Ventoux is a shrine for cyclists of all types, but especially the huge numbers of people who venture south from Britain to test themselves against the
mountain that claimed his life and to pay their own respects, even forty or more years after he was taken from us.

On the last day of true combat in the 2009 Tour de France, Bradley Wiggins was looking to pay his own special tribute to the memory of Tom Simpson by riding to the top of that very mountain
without losing the company of the elite riders he had shadowed for three weeks. Bucking the formbook, expectation and his own lack of history in the world’s greatest race, he was determined
to ride into Paris the following day as the first Englishman to finish fourth in the Tour de France.

There were a few people who wanted to stop him. Lance Armstrong’s comeback bid to win an unprecedented eighth Tour de France may have ended in failure, but the Texan still had a podium
finish to hang on to, and making that safe didn’t involve helping Bradley Wiggins. Andreas Klöden was only two seconds behind Brad on GC and would love to grab back the time that Wiggins
had stolen off him in the Annecy time trial. Even more dangerous was the resurgent Frank Schleck, keen to get as close to his brother as possible, and possibly shoulder Armstrong, Wiggins and
Klöden all aside to join his younger brother below Contador on the podium in Paris. He had been climbing brilliantly in this final week and already had a great stage victory to his name. He
needed just 23 small seconds to clamber over Brad and Klöden. Even Vincenzo Nibali, at less than two minutes, could not be disregarded on the slopes of the bald mountain.

Unsurprisingly, Frank is the first to move. He jumps out of the rapidly diminishing yellow jersey group but is comfortably countered by Armstrong, and the others regain the duo’s back
wheels. Next Andy goes, not really attacking Contador – he is four minutes behind – but looking to unhitch Klöden, Wiggins and Armstrong in favour of his brother. Contador takes up
long-term residence on his wheel and won’t shift until prised off it by
soigneurs
at the finish. Frank tries again, and this one is fierce. Klöden is hating this and regains the
group by the skin of his teeth. Only Andy, Frank, Contador, Armstrong, Wiggins, Nibali and Klöden remain, and the German is in agony.

Andy attacks once more, Contador on him like flypaper. Frank and Armstrong stare each other down and let the move go, Brad following in their wheel tracks. Nibali bridges across to the front
two. If they decide to go for the stage and catch Juan Manuel Gárate, the long-time leader, this could be a problem. Andy sits up though, conscious that his brother isn’t there. The
group reforms.

The brothers try to go together this time. Armstrong covers, much to Frank’s visible frustration. What does he have to do? This is one acceleration too much for the brave Klöden and
he finally loses his grasp on the group. Wiggins makes it, but it’s a massive effort and he is in obvious discomfort. The wheels in front start to drift away from him and his head bobs
alarmingly as he tries everything to stay with them.

Bravo, Brad! screams the ghost of Tom Simpson in his ear, as he somehow finds the power to grind back up to the Schlecks, Contador and Armstrong. Klöden has blown; Nibali is struggling but
still there. The final battle for this brilliant Tour will take place over this last kilometre.

Andy surges forward one more time, and only Contador and Armstrong can follow. Frank puts his head down and slowly but surely opens a gap on Brad. Frank has overtaken Klöden on GC for sure,
and only needs 24 seconds to overhaul Bradley Wiggins for fourth spot.

Come on, Brad!
Come on!

The cameras focus on the finish line, where Gárate hangs on for the greatest win of his career. The Schlecks, Alberto Contador and Lance Armstrong cross together, the final peace treaty
drawn up amid a mutual admiration for each other’s performance.

But where’s Brad? The clock is ticking. Please, Mr TV Director, show us Brad. Here he comes! Come on! Come on, Brad! It’s going to be close. Where the hell is that finish line?

Bradley Wiggins hauls himself over the line on top of Mont Ventoux in four hours, 40 minutes and 24 seconds. That is twenty seconds behind Frank Schleck. He will hold on to his fourth place in
Paris. After nearly 3,500km of racing, three slender seconds separate him from Frank Schleck in fifth.

Chapeau
, Mr Wiggins! says the ghost of Tom Simpson.

There is only one team in this Tour de France that is yet to place a rider in a breakaway of any kind. This is most likely because they are desperately trying to control such
occurrences and need all hands to the pump, especially after being reduced to eight men early in the race.

It is of course Team Sky we’re talking about. Both their main objectives – keeping the race together to protect the lead of Bradley Wiggins and getting Mark Cavendish to the end of
flat stages in a position to win the sprint – require control of breaks.

However, the Spanish Movistar team director José Luis Arrieta has a different theory about the British squad’s absence in moves. It’s because Team Sky, like every other team
in the Tour, can only have two cars in the race and one of them, according to Arrieta, has to be with Mark Cavendish at all times. ‘The sprinter and World Champion always requires a team car
for when he gets dropped,’ Arrieta told the Spanish daily
El País
. This view of Cavendish as something of a prima donna is at odds with the daily shots of the rainbow jersey
trekking back through the bunch to gather drinks for all his teammates then distributing them with the care and diligence of a devoted butler. But Arrieta is confident in his view that Team Sky
don’t just put Bernie Eisel at Cav’s disposal, but a Jaguar and crew, too. He thinks that this personal backroom is at the root of the lack of Team Sky attacks, as there is no other car
to slot in behind such a move to offer assistance. ‘Since each team has a maximum of two vehicles, and one must be with the team leader, that prevents Froome launching an attack or another
like Boasson Hagen or Knees.’

Team Sky would like to win today’s stage, but they’re not planning on doing it via the medium of the long breakaway. They have a Plan A and also a Plan B, but first the day’s
primary objective must be achieved: the security of the yellow jersey.

Sean Yates and Dave Brailsford prepare the team for the day’s tribulations behind the blacked-out windows of the Team Sky bus with as much care as any day. ‘The big issue today is
going to be crosswinds. There’s a run in to the Cap along the coast that’s a big open area. Forecast will be for cross-headwinds, so be aware. Don’t get caught in the wrong part
of the bunch if it splits,’ warns Yates.

The crosswinds are perennial issues on days like today. An alert HTC squad led by Mick Rogers famously put the cat among the pigeons during Lance Armstrong’s comeback Tour de France in
2009. The old stager was cagey enough to sense what was about to happen as the peloton was struck by some heavy winds and the entire HTC squad moved to the front and put the pedal to the metal. His
‘co-leader’ and defending champion Alberto Contador was less astute, as Rogers and his HTC hitmen pulled the race apart and caused not only a split in the field but a split in the
Astana team camp. By the finish – naturally won by Mark Cavendish to make it mission accomplished for HTC – Armstrong was claiming that his newly won lead over Contador ought to make
him the more privileged and protected Astana rider.

The danger with the wind is that when one rider loses contact with the wheel in front, it quickly becomes extremely difficult to bridge that gap. If that happens to several riders at once, as is
often the case, there can suddenly be four or five groups on the road. A rider can lose time without getting dropped, just being caught in the wrong group. Awareness is everything, hence Brailsford
and Yates’s attempts to drum the message home and their close examination of the day’s
parcours
.

When the race meets the coastal strip, just a little way along the seafront from that day in 2009, Team Sky are all diligently in their places near the front. It’s been a relatively easy
day for the troops so far, as Orica-GreenEDGE have once again taken up much of the chasing to hunt down the day’s break. They’ve got nothing out of this race so far, and with Simon
Gerrans their highest-placed rider in the GC, a lowly 62nd, a stage win is imperative. Matt Goss has come close a couple of times. He’s a great sprinter from a group, but it remains unproven
as to whether he can really beat the fastest guys on a level playing field. However, today’s route features a short but sharp little climb along that stretch of coast and the Orica-GreenEDGE
boss Neil Stephens is working on the assumption that many of the fastest finishers will be shelled out of the rear of the race by the high speeds and gradient.

Another Australian with action on his mind is the proud champion Cadel Evans. Normally, a transitional second-week stage in the Tour between the Alps and Pyrenees would see the favourites biding
their time, conserving their energy and waiting for something to happen. In his earlier days, Evans was considered a conservative rider, but we had to rip up that view of him after his daring
attack to win the 2009 World Championships at Mendrisio in Switzerland. The devastating move to crush an elite lead group of hitters surprised everyone and the rainbow jersey brought a
transformation in the previously ‘boring, boring Evans’. It was this new attacking Cadel Evans who won the 2011 Tour de France rather than the Mk 1 serial second-and-third-placed
Evans.

So, it shouldn’t surprise us when he makes his move approaching the small climb of Mont Saint Clair, punctuating the coastal route between Montpellier and Le Cap d’Agde, but there is
a stirring of excitement nevertheless. Neil Stephens’s prediction is correct, and several fast men slip away from the front group. Bradley Wiggins and his men cruise up behind the adventurous
Evans without any great hardship, but Team Sky’s Plan A for today is in tatters, as the rainbow jersey of Mark Cavendish is one of the many distanced by the reduced peloton as it flies up the
hill at the sort of pace that most of us reserve for coming down the other side of such obstacles.

This is great news for Orica-GreenEDGE, who continue to not only seek to position Matt Goss for the finish, but also throw the lively Michael Albasini on the attack. A sight that won’t
have pleased Stephens’s men quite so much is the line of Lotto Belisol riders taking over the pacemaking at the head of the race. That can only mean one thing: Andre Greipel has not suffered
the fate of Cavendish, and he is still in the front group. That’s not all . . . The green jersey of Liquigas-Cannondale’s Peter Sagan is also spotted hanging in at the business end of
affairs. Goss could well have done with seeing the back of them. To be brutal, all he’s done is see the back of them as they cross finish lines just ahead of him for the last week or two.

For Team Sky, it’s time for Plan B. The crosswinds are at their stiffest along this last stretch of rather grim industrial coastal strip towards Agde. It’s like the Camargue but in
some Ballardian post-apocalyptic future, with power lines and the occasional warehouse standing in for white bulls and flamingos. We can see a Team Sky rider in a white jersey holding his place in
their line as they cruise along with the faster teams at the front, but it’s not the pattern of the rainbow around it, it’s the flag of Norway, and Edvald Boasson Hagen is wearing
it.

As the bunch snakes its way at silly speeds into the narrow streets and corners of the last couple of kilometres, Team Sky hit the front to stretch the race to its limits for the Norwegian. But
it’s not a black, blue and white Team Sky jersey on the front, or even the Norwegian Champion’s top. Incredibly, it’s the race leader himself, Bradley Marc Wiggins in the yellow
jersey and yellow helmet, his stealthy black Pinarello wearing yellow detail in honour of his status, leaving the whole Tour de France gasping for breath as they attempt to follow his acceleration
in aid of his teammate.

Boasson Hagen blasts off his leader’s wheel in search of the line with a mighty effort, but it’s not quite enough to beat those pesky sprinters. Greipel and Sagan finish one and two,
with Boasson Hagen taking a fine third place behind them to add to his brace of second spots in the opening week. For all Orica-GreenEDGE’s superb efforts to take the race by the scruff of
the neck, they have to settle for Daryl Impey’s fifth in the sprint.

Greipel is particularly pleased by his win due to his scaling of Mont Saint Clair with the main field when many of his rivals, Cavendish being the most notable, were unable to follow. It may not
have proved that he is the fastest sprinter, but he would argue that he is the better cyclist. It is an argument that won’t be settled today, but this win is a tick in his column without a
doubt.