We hear the nation’s cycling hero has gone, well, weird. FHM tracks him down at the world’s most dangerous bike race to discover the truth… WORDS: Daniel masoliver PHOTOGRAPHY: graham hughes sir 080at the hell ofMONTH the north 2014 081 starting combination of talent and training; arms and down your spine, try line of a feather-light weight to fly up hills, strapping a pneumatic drill to bike race and unnatural endurance to survive your neck and hopping on your is a wet three weeks and 3,000km of racing. bike. For six hours. dream for autograph hunters. Here, The - is a unique and Flying over the narrow, uneven in the historic central square of notorious challenge; a brutal relic of roads at 60km per hour takes raw Compiègne, some 50 miles north- cycling’s past. After the first world power and sizeable cojones. For the east of Paris, 199 professional war, a group of cyclists took to the past decade, the race has been cyclists make their way from their route to find out if the roads still dominated by Belgian team buses to a small stage where even existed, or if they’d been and Swiss rider , they will register for ’s event. shelled to smithereens. They found two cycling heavyweights, in every Passing through the throng of the cobbled roads, alright. With sense of the word. Beanpole Tour de fans, they mix and mingle with the them they encountered the stench France champs like Wiggins don’t crowd, posing for photos, waving of raw sewage and rotting cattle, stand a chance here – this is the at gawking children and signing and the charred and twisted reason no Tour winner has raced jerseys, caps and the occasional remains of the desolate landscape. the Paris-Roubaix in 22 years, and body part. Among the pros are They called it ‘the Hell of the North’. none have won it in 33. Probably some of the biggest names in The name stuck. Nowadays, the why, when asked what he made cycling, all of them within touching route may look less hellish, but it of Wiggins’ decision to take part, distance of their elated supporters. remains just as treacherous. On defending champion Cancellara All of them, that is, but one. A these cobbles in 1998, legendary literally laughed off his chances. scrawny-looking bloke sporting Belgian rider a short ginger beard and a stern crashed in spectacular style, almost expression emerges from the losing his leg to gangrene as a Two years ago, a mutton-chopped Team Sky bus flanked by four burly result. Three years later, when mod on a £10,000 bike rode men. The man’s face shows no Frenchman Philippe Gaumont his way into the history books. acknowledgement of the cries of came off his bike on the same In the space of two months, a bloke “Wiggo! Wiggo!” that erupt around section, his femur tore through raised on the busy city streets of him as he quickly mounts his his thigh muscle as it displaced north London became the first bicycle and disappears into the his kneecap and snapped in two. British winner of the direction of the registration zone. These are not exceptional events in the event’s 120-year history, and Moments later, having threaded over the Paris-Roubaix cobbles. the most decorated British Olympian his way through the camera phones Participants from every edition of all . And still, in the face of being waved in front of his face, of the race’s 112-year history have all the praise and plaudits heaped he’s back behind the blacked-out the scars to show for their efforts. on him, he retained a charming, windows of the bus, safely hidden “It’s the one race a year where typically British reserve, tinged from the assembled rabble of we go over, like little babies’ heads,” with his singular eccentricity. international fans and media stood says Wiggins’ Sky teammate, To mark these unparalleled outside in the warm spring sun. of the massive achievements, he was honoured It’s exactly as we’d feared. You see, cobbles, talking to us while with his own stamp, voted BBC we’d heard that Bradley Wiggins scribbling his name on photos for Sports Personality of the Year, and had gone a bit… odd. That he’d grateful French fans. “It’s seen as eventually knighted by the Queen turned into some sort of a recluse. the hard man’s race, because it is so – an honour he humbly felt he didn’t Sheltered from public view, he’d hard. Everything aches afterwards deserve. Aged 32, Bradley Wiggins been spotted during a training – it’s not just your legs, but your had gone from a relatively unknown camp in Majorca eating alone arms, your knuckles, your back…” athlete in a niche sport (despite behind a screen, while his If you want to experience the being a decorated veteran of three teammates sat together on the other shockwaves that ripple up your ), to a fully-fledged side. What’s more, since losing the national treasure. An icon. Top and left: Wiggo mobbed by supporters on his way leadership of Team Sky to Chris Yet today, he remains an enigma. to the start line Froome, his targets have taken a “ If you want to And his star power, professionally Below: A cheeky Dutch fan gees up his fellow spectators turn for the bonkers. No Tour de speaking if not publicly, seems France or world title in his sights experience the to be on the wane. A combination this year. Instead, today’s event, of injury and in-fighting kept him the Paris-Roubaix 2014 – the most Paris-Roubaix, off last year’s Tour de France team, difficult and dangerous 257km and Team Sky selector Shane you can race on a bike. We went try strapping Sutton has already announced that to northern France to find out Wiggins may well be off the roster what’s happened to Sir Wiggo, a pneumatic again come July 2014. Even here and what the fudge he’s doing here. drill to your neck at the Paris-Roubaix, where he’s risking his reputation (and a few and hopping on broken bones), he’s the team’s The Paris-Roubaix is no place number-three rider. Worst of all, for a man like Bradley Wiggins. your bike. For that characteristic reserve has Sure, to win the Tour de France like started to feel even more like Wiggins did in 2012 takes a special six hours” standoffishness, aloofness even.

082 july 2014 083 One man who understands what it is to walk in Bradley Wiggins’ clip-in cleats is Greg LeMond, the three-time victor of the Tour de France (and the last one to take on the Paris-Roubaix in ’92). LeMond, here today in his new role on the punditry team, tells us that winning the Tour can be as much of a burden as a blessing. “I watched what happened to Bradley – he became a star,” says the silver-haired American, sporting the fully deserved paunch of a long-retired athlete. “It’s a dramatic change in your personal life. It takes a tremendous amount of energy out of you. Suddenly, instead of putting your head down and training throughout the winter, it’s all chat shows and award ceremonies, nosy interviews and intrusive paparazzi. You’ve got a tank full of energy, and if half of that tank is spent on all this other shit, it affects your cycling.” LeMond continues: “After my ’86 Tour victory, I almost didn’t care if I ever raced again. Some people can handle one victory, but it might take them a year or two to recover.” Yet here Bradley Wiggins is, two years on since his win, and he shows few signs of recovery. He could cope with lugging his bike up French mountainsides, but his MasterChef, then finding out all at the starting line, we bump into Above: Four-time Paris-Roubaix winner Tom Boonen swear there was a hint of Roubaix cobbles. And now, with new-found role as the face – and previous winners had just been Barry Ryan, European editor and leads the pack on a dry, dusty cobbled section sadness there, too. Every those other more newsworthy voice – of cycling? Not so much. As heating up microwave meals.) writer for Cycling News, who has Above right: The battered and bruised survivors time he eats behind a victories under his belt, he can everyone is all too aware, cycling’s We may have worshipped his spent the past few years dutifully of the race at the screen or is hurried on to finally have a go. Wiggins hates recent past has been plagued with sideburned brilliance in Britain, following Wiggins’ career. Ryan a bus, he must feel a part the expectations that come with lies, corruption and more substance but during his interactions with shares the disappointment in Ryan is not by any means of his boyhood love of cycling, and being a champ, with being a abuse than a Wall Street Christmas the world’s media, Wiggins was Wiggins’ recent elusive behaviour. exaggerating; Wiggins has an its accessibility fade away and die. celebrity, a star – well, there are no party. And as the most prominent having to defend himself, and “Cycling isn’t like any other almost encyclopaedic knowledge expectations for him to succeed at face of the sport, the Tour’s yellow the sport he so passionately loves, sport,” he says. “Part of the big of the sport’s past. He knows who the Paris-Roubaix, and you get the jersey wearer has become the on almost a daily basis. Being attraction is that the riders engage won what race in what year, which In 1993, Wiggins, aged 13, would feeling that suits him just fine. mouthpiece for the state of cycling. a poster boy for clean cycling so regularly with the press and the riders were in the breakaway group, hop on his bike in Kilburn and And here he is: after a punishing “Winning the Tour in this period might suit the more extroverted public; they’re close enough that and where the decisive attack was seek out London’s cobbled streets. six hours, Wiggins enters the is sad,” says LeMond, one of Lance members of the peloton, but for you can touch them.” But then launched. Wiggins is a devoted mod, He wanted to emulate his hero business end of the race in the lead Armstrong’s fiercest critics. “You the naturally shy Wiggins, it was Sky came along and changed all lover of , buttoned-up Johan Museeuw (pre-gangrenous group of 11 riders. Alongside him should be able to take the pleasure a weighty imposition. that. “They’ve looked at it more polo shirts and Liverpool FC, but leg) and his exploits over in this are Boonen and Cancellara – not of that victory, but Bradley doesn’t The result – sadly, but perhaps from the perspective of, ‘What more than anything, he is a cycling part of the world. And that is the quite so cocky anymore – attacking get the satisfaction that, say, I did, predictably – was that Team Sky would Manchester United do?’ super-geek. That might go some real reason Bradley Wiggins is and counter-attacking each other because of all the questions. It’s not would close ranks, bundle Wiggins They would probably see it as way to explaining the look in his risking life and shaven limb to at breakneck speeds, sweat pouring fair to riders that are racing clean, up in bubble wrap and shelter him bringing a professional standard eyes as he takes his place on the bump, rattle and race over the Paris- off their grit-caked faces. but it’s the reality.” from the outside world. to the sport, whereas within the start line at Compiègne. Surrounded Roubaix course today. Not because Watching the closing stages Imagine striving your entire life sport, people feel that a lot is being by relaxed and chatty teammates, he’s no longer strong enough to of the race from the finish line for one goal, reaching it, and then lost by behaving that way. And the Wiggins keeps his gaze rooted to ride the Tour de France; not because in Roubaix’s outdoor velodrome, the merit of your achievement being The starting line of the Paris- thing is, deep down, Wiggins knows the floor, avoiding the stares and his glory days are behind him; we see outsider questioned and belittled because Roubaix, the Hell of the North, that, because he grew up with this shouts of the public. He’s in the not because he’s lost his confidence, unexpectedly make a break for of the actions of those who came is only minutes away. In the melee of massive knowledge of cycling zone, preparing for the gruelling but precisely because he always home. Despite Wiggins’ best efforts before you. (A bit like winning fans, media and cyclists assembling and its history and traditions.” 257km that lie ahead, but you’d dreamed of winning over the to chase him down, the Dutchman The Paris-Roubaix: 112 257 51.1 33 369 500 15 Big race, big numbers Editions of this Kilometres of racing Kilometres of back- Years since a Tour de France Minutes taken to Sets of spare wheels along Bidons (cycle-speak for infamous race across north-east France breaking cobbles, split 084 MONTH 2014 winner, like Sir Wiggo, has complete the race by the side of the course bottles) consumed on 085 over 28 sections won the Paris-Roubaix winner Niki Terpstra average by every rider Wiggins and his teammates collapse at the finish line holds strong and takes the glory. “The truth is, Wiggins was always a bit Wiggo crosses the line in ninth place. His whole body quivering weird. That’s exactly why we took him from the effort, his face covered in congealed dirt and drying sweat, into our hearts in the first place” he shakes teammate Thomas’s hand (who finished an impressive seventh), and collapses onto the again? Yes, he’d love to. And next deer caught in the headlights, grassy infield of the velodrome. time, his rivals will no doubt take Wiggins has retreated deeper It’s not the fairy tale ending it his challenge a lot more seriously. into the safety of the darkness. could have been, but a top-10 finish Meanwhile, he says, he has his Three minutes after stepping into in the Paris-Roubaix, for someone sights set on a return to the track, the setting sunlight, his hands still who had been written off as a to add to his record-setting tally shaking from his efforts over the rank-outsider – even a bit of a joke of Olympic medals, at Rio 2016. cobbles, and his autograph-signing – is a serious achievement. One that So, has Bradley Wiggins gone duties performed, he turns around 13-year-old Wiggo on his rickety weird? No. The truth is, he was and climbs back into the comfort wheels would have been proud of. always a bit weird. That’s exactly and security of the bus. When he why we took him into our hearts gets off next, it won’t be for a photo in the first place – this skinny, shy, shoot, a book signing or a media We follow our battered and un-media trained cycle geek, with tour. It’ll be either to return home bruised hero back to the Team an uncanny ability to rub Europeans to his wife and children in rural Sky bus and wait outside, along up the wrong the way and smash Lancashire, or to devastate his with 50 or so fans, for Wiggins to them at their own game. rivals on the roads. re-emerge. Eventually, an exhausted Out of sheer necessity, and the As the doors close behind him Wiggins steps down from the team pressures that come with reaching and the bus speeds back to the bus (flanked, of course, by the the highest heights of professional team hotel – making light work team’s press officer). From this sport, he has slowly withdrawn of the cobblestones that so close, he looks understandably further into himself and his team’s recently pounded the bodies of tired, but surprisingly at ease, protective bubble. But as those its passengers – the fans are left given the claustrophobic proximity closest to him attest, he hasn’t shouting in its wake. “Chapeau, of the public. Most importantly, changed one bit. He always wanted Wiggo, chapeau.” Hats off, Wiggo, he’s pleased with his performance. to compete in the most prestigious you wonderful weirdo. “There’re not many Tour winners cycle races on the circuit, but the that have been top 10 in the Paris- fame, attention and scrutiny was Watch every stage of Team Sky’s Roubaix,” he tells us. “I can think not something he was prepared for. defence of the Tour de France of two in my head, so on a personal Some people shine in the spotlight, and all the summer’s finest note, it’s a nice thing.” Will he do it actively seek it out even, but like a cycling action live on Eurosport

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