Anyone who grew up in and around British cycling, much like myself from the late 80's until 2008, will know all to well what it was like to take a rooting interest in a British cyclist. It went as far as Chris Boardman and Sean Yates for years in the hope that the former might win the prologue and the later might win a stage. That era reached it's peak in 1994 when Chris Boardman took the Yellow at that opening mini-time-trial. He lost it a few days later before the race travelled through the south of England, and -- call it bad timing (kind of!) -- when it left those shores back to France, Sean Yates got into a break and pulled it on himself. Two British men in Yellow in the same Tour ... in the first week of the same tour. Of course, nobody expected it to last -- Brits didn't win the Tour -- and it didn't. Miguel Indurain won his forth straight title while Boardman abandoned on stage 11 and Yates finished well down the pecking order. How times have changed.
A few years ago a young Manx man by the name of Mark Cavendish broke onto the scene proving himself to be the best sprinter in the world and no longer was British tour stage wins reserved for Boardman (or later David Miller) in prologues or a Sean Yates or Max Scinadri break, but frequent bunch gallops. He won the green jersey last year and the then World Championships. But even by then Bradley Wiggins had turned himself from a time-trial specialist who had delved into the stage race scene between his championship efforts on the track, to a genuine top ten man of the Tour. It was all too new.
Wiggins finished forth in 2009 equalling the best British effort ever by Robert Miller and British cycling had itself a dream. If truth be told I wasn't sure Wiggins could ever better that. I thought he might stand a chance, but given the potential of Andy Schleck and Alberto Contador, it would always be hard. He had a bad outing in 2010 and crashed out in 2011, but turned up in Spain for the Vuelta later that year and finished third ... Yet that still wasn't good enough to make him the best British rider. Some bloke called Chris Froome came out of nowhere to beat him into second and while he was born in Kenya and only registered with the British Cycling Federation after a fallout with the Kenyans, Froome was more than welcomed into the British fold by the media.
2012 seen Team Sky put both these two into virtual lockdown regarding their training. They would disappear for long stretches to dedicate themselves entirely towards the Tour de France, with Wiggins showing up at the likes of the Paris-Nice to take the win and head back to his training base. All reports, and results, suggested Wiggins was in the form of his life and for the first time since Tom Simpson in the 1960's, British cycling fans had a genuine Tour favourite to get behind.
Which brings me to this morning ... 21 years after I remember watching my first Tour de France, and suddenly, we have not one, but two genuine British contenders for the Tour. Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome went out and trampled their way across the individual time-trial stage to a one-two victory that put Wiggins further into Yellow and moved Froome up into third place overall. Yes, after waiting all this time there is the very real possibility that in two weeks from now we could have a British man standing a top the podium in Paris with the Yellow jersey over his shoulders, and another Brit standing beside him in second place.
So typical of the British ... like a London bus I've waited 21-years for one man to win the Tour, and now two have come along at once.
