Rio Olympics 2016: Great Bradley Wiggins preparing to say goodbye where it all started in Ghent
IT all started back in Ghent, Belgium, watching his dad hammer round a track like there was no tomorrow.
So there is nowhere else Bradley Wiggins would want it to end.
Three months from now, he will push a body far older than his 36 years through six more days of torture in the town where he was born. Then he will climb out of the saddle. And that will be that.
Wiggins has done too much to be pitied as the champ who clambered into the ring once too often and left as a chump.
Which is why, as a fifth gold medal glittered on his chest and he told you his Olympic days were done, you looked in his eyes and knew he meant it.
But what a way to bow out. Hauling his crew through a heart-stopping team pursuit final in the bedlam of Rio’s velodrome, hunting down the Aussies inch by inch until the crowd vibe changed and they sensed glory was in their grasp — if only they could grind out one last change in pace from their aching thighs.
When they found it and turned a 0.6sec deficit into a 0.5sec lead — an eternity in these races — I can honestly say it has rarely been my privilege to experience such perfect sporting drama.
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Wiggins, Ed Clancy, Steven Burke and Owain Doull were poetry in motion, four man-machines in skin-tight petrol blue moving as one on brilliant white bikes, propelled ever faster by an uncanny awareness of where the opposition were.
As they crossed the line, all but Wiggins exploded with joy. Their leader, their hero, their mate, was too emptied of energy to do anything but gulp in lungfuls of air.
All he could think of right then was a beer . . . and a happy retirement.
He admits he has been “getting all nostalgic” these last few days, which maybe explains the choice of race to bring down the curtain.
He had a troubled relationship with dad Gary, an Aussie-born pro cyclist who deserted him aged two. He was estranged for 14 years and then absent from Gary’s funeral after he died in mysterious circumstances following a fight at a party in New South Wales. But as a lifetime’s effort comes to an end, the pull of his childhood is taking him home.
WINS GALORE
OLYMPIC medal machine Bradley Wiggins has also enjoyed stunning success away from the Games.
2010: Wins Tour of Qatar.
2011: Wins National Road Race Championships.
2012: Wins Tour de France, named BBC Sports Personality of the Year.
2013: Wins Tour of Britain and Tour de Pologne.
2014: Wins UCI World Time Trial Championships. First overall in Tour of California.
2015: Smashes UCI Hour Record, riding 54.526km.
2016: Wins Madison (with Mark Cavendish) at UCI Track World Championships.
Wiggo, who was born in Ghent, where Gary was based, said: “It’s all just a relief. I’m thinking, ‘Thank f*** I don’t have to wake up on Monday and have to have this burden on me’. It’s gone now.
“After 16 years and five gold medals, I wanted it to end like this. I’m not going to Tokyo in 2020. I’d love to but I couldn’t take another four years of this, all those early mornings in December in Manchester with c**p skinsuits and c**p helmets, because they only bring out the good gear for the big events.
“So I’ll go home on Monday, see the kids, get out on my bike and then do the Tour of Britain in a couple of weeks.
“Then, in November, my last race will be the Six Days of Ghent.
“That’s my first memory of cycling, watching dad compete. It feels like the right place to bring it all to an end.
“It was lovely that Sir Steve Redgrave and Sir Chris Hoy were the first two people I bumped into when I came off the track.
“Have I superseded what Chris has done? No. I might have eight medals to his seven but who counts bronzes? He has six golds.
“But I’ve been an Olympic champion for 12 years and I’ll wake up tomorrow morning still an Olympic champ.
“It’s the first team I’ve been in where everyone brought the same to the table.”
Which only left one name to be mentioned: Mark Cavendish.
Left out of the pursuit team, he went on TV to moan that it was all because Wiggins “needed to be the hero”.
Wiggo said: “The other day he was hugging me and telling me he loves me.
“We gave him the opportunity at the training camp in Newport to come into the team and he didn’t deliver.
“After being together as a team for 18 months, we couldn’t afford any risks. He knew that and knows I didn’t freeze him out.”