Stage 8 -- July 8: Belfort to Porrentruy, 157.5 km (97.9 mi)
Brad Wiggins stepped onto the podium to retain his Yellow jersey, then stepped into a press conference with a few choice words to his doubters. Photograph: Fotoreporter Sirotti
You have to feel sorry for Thibault Pinot. He won the stage today yet this is the only mention he's going to get about it. A Frenchman winning a Tour de France stage in an area in which he is a local. It should have been one of the feel good stories of this Tour so far, yet the headlines for it will be buried deep into the days coverage and stories thanks to an Englishman, Brad Wiggins, and his tongue lashing to the doubters.
Brad Wiggins, just twenty-four hours into his leadership of the Tour de France should have known it was coming, but when it did, he blew up. No, I don't mean that he had to know the attacks were coming and that when they did he blew up losing big time and his race lead ... Wiggins finished in the main group and lost no time ... what I'm referring to took place after the race was done, after Wiggins had done his little warm down spin and took his place in front of the worlds media to describe the cynics as "C***s".
“Honestly, they're just f**king w**kers," Wiggins said when a reporter asked what he had to say about those that think it's not possible to win the Tour without doping. "I cannot be dealing with people like that. It justifies their own bone-idleness because they can't ever imagine applying themselves to anything in their lives. And it's easy for them to sit under a pseudo-name on Twitter and write that sort of s**t rather than get off their arses in their own life and apply themselves, and work hard at something and achieve something. And that's ultimately it.” He then reached for the microphone again to confirm his feelings: "C***s".
It was an outrageous outburst by any big-time sporting standards, but one from which you can't help but feel sympathetic towards. If anything I like that Wiggins speaks as a fan might in the pub, that he speaks his mind and doesn't come across as a PR trained robot like many athletes of the modern era. We complain that our sporting stars are too well paid and too far removed from society; that they are far to wooden to relate to the real fan and we long for a character who says what he thinks. Then we complain when Wiggins goes off on one like he did.
That isn't to say I condone the language, but I can see why he got frustrated. And anyway it goes much much deeper than whether or not we want our athletes being so honest.
Some people feel the journalist was right to ask the question of honesty within the race ... we've been let down too many times in the past by riders we thought we could believe in that any long time fan of the sport couldn't be anything but a cynic. Some people feel Wiggins didn't do enough to renounce doping in his statement and that he merely defended the hard work they put into getting to where they are at ... the kind of quote we might have heard once upon a time from a certain Lance Armstrong.
But with Wiggins, for me at least, it's very different. Wiggins has renounced doping on a number of occasions before. Back in 2007 his Cofidis team withdrew from the race when his team-mate Cristian Moreni failed a doping test to the point of which Wiggins threatened to quit the sport.
"I don't want to continue in the Tour de France anyway, it is not supposed to be like this," he told the Guardian at the time. "It is completely gutting to have to quit the Tour but everyone knows where I stand on doping. I have nothing to hide. It's pure stupidity on the part of Moreni. I don't know how he can have slipped through the net. It makes you think about your future as a professional cyclist. It makes me question the whole thing, but then you think why not continue because I get a lot of pleasure out of it."
Wiggins stuck around and the next year joined the HighRoad team which would later become HTC Columbia, a team known for it's strict anti-doping stance. He has since spoke out against doping a number of times, and while that serves of no proof that he is 100 percent clean, there's nothing here in 2012 to suggest that he isn't. If we're going to assume that they're all dirty from the get-go and no longer believe a good guy like Wiggins can come along, then why indeed are we watching? If you think the sport is inherently dirty, then find another sport.
That was a question I posed to myself a few years back after Floyd Landis let a lot of supporters down by cheating his way to a Tour de France title, and then on a number of occasions with a number of other riders in the years that followed. But there's been a real shift in attitudes within the professional peloton. It isn't to suggest every single rider is clean now, but I think it's safe to say we're in a much better place today than we were in 2006, than we were in 2003, or indeed the 1990's.
Shift the train of thought put forth by some, that Wiggins' sudden rise to competing for the Tour de France suggests he is probably doping, to the idea that perhaps a cleaner peloton has allowed for someone like Wiggins -- and indeed Chris Froome -- to compete at the front and then you might have a better idea as to where we're at. Likewise for Cadel Evans last year -- don't fool yourself that the Alberto Contador looked human last summer because he was tired from the Giro alone and that it had nothing to do with the fact there was a lot of heat on him from the Tour before from which he is currently serving his ban. Look at the times for going up certain climbs now, compared to a decade ago? They're summiting climbs minutes slower than in a dirty past.
Anyway, did Wiggins fail to utter the words many would have loved him to say, that "I'm clean and I despise those who dope", on purpose? Or was he speaking angrily towards those who he feels are unfairly speculating that he could be drugging? I don't see Wiggins' statement as a non-condemnation of doping, and rather him saying that he works his ass off to get to where his is clean, yet he has these keyboard warriors hiding behind the pseudonym questioning his integrity. Yes, it was probably wrong of him to get so upset at any fan questioning the sport but thanks to those that have gone before him -- the Pantani's, Armstrong's, Landis' and Ulrich's of this world -- it's something he, or anyone in Yellow, has to get used to.
I think Wiggins represents the potential of what cycling can be as it looks to put its ugly past behind him. It may be an act of madness given what's gone on before, but then it's because we love the sport that we keep coming back and if we aren't going to believe that clean men can win, then why are we even watching?
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QUOTE OF THE DAY
“Honestly, they're just f**king w**kers," Wiggins said. "I cannot be dealing with people like that. It justifies their own bone-idleness because they can't ever imagine applying themselves to anything in their lives. And it's easy for them to sit under a pseudo-name on Twitter and write that sort of s**t rather than get off their arses in their own life and apply themselves, and work hard at something and achieve something. And that's ultimately it.” -- Brad Wiggins. Seriously, what other quote was ever going to get in ahead of this?
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FAKE TWEET OF THE DAY
@ThibautPinot Thanks Bradley.
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ABANDONMENT'S
Johanes Fröhlinger of Argos-Shimano failed to start the day while Euskaltel-Euskadi lost two riders during the day in Gorka Verdugo and Samuel Sanchez, the later of which was their big hope for a podium position in Paris and who went down hard in a crash early in the stage.
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STAGE 8 RESULT
1. Thibaut Pinot (Fra) FDJ-BigMat in 3-56-10
2. Cadel Evans (Aus) BMC Racing at 26 secs
3. Tony Gallopin (Fra) RadioShack-Nissan
4. Bradley Wiggins (GBr) Sky
5. Vincenzo Nibali (Ita) Liquigas-Cannondale
6. Jurgen Van Den Broeck (Bel) Lotto-Belisol
7. Chris Froome (GBr) Sky
8. Denis Menchov (Rus) Katusha
9. Haimar Zubeldia (Spa) RadioShack-Nissan all same time
10. Frank Schleck (Lux) RadioShack-Nissan at 30 secs
GENERAL CLASSIFICATION AFTER STAGE 8
1. Bradley Wiggins (GBr) Team Sky in 38-17-56
2. Cadel Evans (Aus) BMC Racing Team at 10 secs
3. Vincenzo Nibali (Ita) Liquigas-Cannondale at 16 secs
4. Denis Menchov (Rus) Katusha at 54 secs
5. Haimar Zubeldia (Spa) RadioShack-Nissan at 59 secs
6. Chris Froome (GBr) Sky at 1-32
7. Maxime Monfort (Bel) RadioShack-Nissan at 2-08
8. Jurgen Van Den Broeck (Bel) Lotto-Belisol at 2-11
9. Nicolas Roche (Irl) Ag2r La Mondiale at 2-21
10. Rein Taaramae (Est) Cofidis at 2-27
