Bradley Wiggins performs on the rest day

That kind of sounds like he gathered all the riders together and did a stand-up routine or sang I Will Survive by Gloria Gaynor for them. But no, he’s actually elsewhere, racing on his bicycle.

Specifically, he’s at the Tour of California, an eight-day stage race which isn’t quite as important as it thinks it is – not least for the fact that the form riders are all appearing in the Giro d’Italia right now. Even so, some teams target the race for sponsor reasons and one of those teams is Sky, who are focusing on Wiggins. It’s like it’s 2012 again.

Yesterday was the time trial. Taylor Phinney promised stiff competition, having beaten Tony Martin and Fabian Cancellara against the clock in the Dubai Tour earlier in the year. However, he could only finish third. Second place was the Rider of Rohan (Rohan Dennis) who was, presumably, sort of happy with that result:

“The one person I was worried about was Jesse Sergent as sort of a dark horse. He beat me in Romandie, and I was waiting for his time to sort of confirm that I would get a podium at least. Once that was sort of past I was pretty relaxed, and I was hoping Wiggo wouldn’t take too much time out of me. But he sort of did that.”

He did indeed. Wiggo’s victory margin was a sizeable 44 seconds. However, perhaps more pertinently, he’s back to ‘Twiggo’ weight. Having attained a relatively healthy body mass for last year’s World Championships time trial and this year’s cobbled classics, he’s now reverted to his monastic life of beetroot soup and general denial.

Wiggins is looking to ride the Tour de France in support of Froome, but if he’s in top form and at his lowest weight, he could also aim for a decent overall placing himself. This might be jumping the gun though. The next few days in California should give some idea how he’s  climbing.


Comments

4 responses to “Bradley Wiggins performs on the rest day”

  1. Nothing really constructive/witty to say, but it looks as if it’s been a while since you had any comments and I don’t want you to feel that no-one cares.

    1. Thanks, but I’m not at all dispirited. I can see that the site’s pretty busy. It just isn’t one that gets a lot of comments for whatever reason. Maybe there’ll be a tipping point. Sometimes when people see a few comments, they’re more inclined to join in.

      Oddly, I get more emails than comments. I don’t know whether that says something about cycling people or not.

  2. In that case I will fade back into my usual ‘lurker’ status, happy in the knowledge that you’re not wiping a solitary tear each evening as you check for comments……although while I’m here, can I put in a request for an occasional post on one of the women’s events?

    1. You can. The problem I have is finding the time to properly follow those races on top of what I already do follow. But you’re right, I should.

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