{"id":191059,"date":"2025-10-10T18:32:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-10T18:32:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/191059\/"},"modified":"2025-10-10T18:32:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-10T18:32:10","slug":"sky-chucked-me-under-a-bus-itll-come-out-bradley-wiggins-says-doping-accusations-enabled-team-to-protect-someone-else","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/191059\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cSky chucked me under a bus\u2026 It\u2019ll come out\u201d: Bradley Wiggins says doping accusations enabled team to \u201cprotect someone else\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sir Bradley Wiggins has claimed that Team Sky \u201cchucked me under a bus\u201d concerning the doping allegations levelled against him, the 2012 Tour de France winner insinuating that the resulting scandals were manipulated to protect someone else and that the truth \u201cwill come out\u201d eventually.<\/p>\n

Wiggins made the claim during an in-depth interview with the Times<\/a>, published on Friday, ahead of the release of his new autobiography, The Chain.<\/p>\n

Speaking to the Times, the five-time Olympic gold medallist discussed the cocaine addiction which marred the years following his retirement<\/a> from cycling, and from which he\u2019s only just emerged, his 2024 bankruptcy<\/a>, his friendship with Lance Armstrong<\/a>, and the sexual abuse he suffered as a teenager<\/a> at the hands of coach Stan Knight.<\/p>\n

And, when asked about the persistent doping allegations, centring on his most successful years at Team Sky, Wiggins was scathing of the British squad\u2019s approach to the controversy, while also insisting that he did not break any anti-doping rules.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was something greater going on,\u201d he told interviewer Polly Vernon. \u201cThey [Team Sky] chucked me under a bus.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vernon then asked Wiggins if that decision was made to protect someone else, to which the 45-year-old replied: \u201cYes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDo you have your suspicions about who?\u201d Vernon then asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cYes. It\u2019ll come out,\u201d Wiggins said.<\/p>\n

\"BradleyBradley Wiggins, 2012 Tour de France (credit: ALAIN BORDAUX\/ICON SPORT\/SWPIX.COM)<\/p>\n

Accusations related to alleged doping offences have plagued Wiggins since his retirement from the sport.<\/p>\n

In October 2016, shortly after Wiggins had won his fifth and final career Olympic gold medal in the team pursuit at Rio, the Fancy Bears hacking group published details of the therapeutic use exemptions (TUEs) for triamcinolone<\/a> obtained on three occasions for the British rider by Sky ahead of the 2011 and 2012 editions of the Tour de France and the 2013 Giro d\u2019Italia.<\/p>\n

The second of those Tours saw Wiggins become the first male British winner of cycling\u2019s biggest race, with Sky and GB teammate Chris Froome finishing second. Froome was also featured in the Fancy Bears hack<\/a>, the four-time Tour winner later claiming that he had arranged the TUEs to treat his asthma.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, triamcinolone, a powerful corticosteroid, was ostensibly obtained by Team Sky doctor Richard Freeman under the TUE system to treat Wiggins\u2019 hay fever, but is also known for its performance enhancing qualities.<\/p>\n

The allegations swirling around Wiggins intensified when details of a jiffy bag delivered to Freeman immediately during the 2011 Criterium du Dauphin\u00e9, which Wiggins also won, emerged, the package and its contents becoming the subject of both a parliamentary enquiry and a UK Anti-Doping (UKAD) investigation.<\/p>\n

In 2016, Team Sky principal Sir Dave Brailsford told the parliamentary enquiry that the package, taken to France from Manchester by a British Cycling employee, contained the decongestant fluimucil, to treat Wiggins\u2019 hay fever.<\/p>\n

>\u00a0Chris Froome distances himself from former carer under investigation for link to doping doctor<\/a><\/p>\n

UKAD\u2019s inquiry into possible wrongdoing in the wake of the revelations was scuppered the lack of records kept by Freeman during his time at British Cycling and Sky \u2013 not helped by the destruction of laptops from that period \u2013 leaving the anti-doping agency unable to determine what exactly was in the package.<\/p>\n

In 2021, Freeman was struck from the medical register<\/a> when it was ruled that his ability to practise medicine had been impaired by misconduct, having been found to have ordered banned testosterone in 2011 \u201cknowing or believing\u201d it was to help dope an unnamed professional cyclist.<\/p>\n

During the lengthy medical tribunal, Freeman admitted ordering 30 packets of Testogel to the Manchester Velodrome in 2011<\/a> and subsequently lying about the order \u2013 which he initially claimed he was bullied into by Sky coach Shane Sutton \u2013 to cover his tracks, though he vehemently denied being a \u201cdoping doctor\u201d.<\/p>\n

Under cross-examination, he also revealed details \u2013 such as pouring the Testogel sachets down the sink at his home \u2013 which he had not admitted either in an interview with UKAD in 2017 or in statements submitted to the medical tribunal.<\/p>\n

Following the tribunal, Freeman was then charged by UKAD with two anti-doping violations and in 2023, after a series of delays, was banned from sport for four years for taking possession of Testogel for unnamed riders<\/a> as well as lying to the anti-doping authorities.<\/p>\n

\"SirSir Bradley Wiggins with his fifth Olympic gold medal (credit: SWpix.com)<\/p>\n

This week\u2019s interview with the Times, of course, isn\u2019t the first time that Wiggins has criticised Team Sky\u2019s management for its handling of the doping allegations which have swirled around the squad on a consistent basis, including at the most recent edition of the Tour, which saw the team\u2019s head soigneur, David Rozman, come under scrutiny for his links to a convicted doping doctor<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In 2018, speaking to the Guardian\u2019s Donald McRae, Wiggins criticised Sir Dave Brailsford\u2019s role <\/a>in the way Sean Yates \u2013 his sports director when Wiggins won the Tour and a former team-mate of Lance Armstrong at Motorola \u2013 departed Team Sky in the immediate wake of Armstrong\u2019s lifetime ban from the sport.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey said his health was the reason but they got rid of him because of the association with Lance,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s typical Dave and Sky. As long as it looks good on paper, fuck what it\u2019s actually like behind the scenes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Elsewhere in his interview with the Times, ahead of the publication of his new book The Chain, Wiggins spoke about his recovery from the cocaine addiction which he says dominated the years following his retirement from the sport and saw him spend time in a \u201ccrack house\u201d in Middlesbrough, sleep in his car and on park benches, and leave him bankrupt.<\/p>\n

In an excerpt from The Chain, Wiggins details a particular dark period in 2018, when he smashed up his 2012 Sports Personality of the Year trophy.<\/p>\n

\u201cI did that in front of my kids,\u201d he wrote. \u201cNo wonder there were times when they talked about trying to put me in rehab. The desecration of my Olympic medal might have happened away from their gaze but it\u2019s equally sad to reflect on.<\/p>\n

\u201cHundreds of thousands of people roaring me on, millions more watching at home. One of the great moments of London 2012, and there I am in a wardrobe, snorting cocaine [off my gold medal], mocking my achievement, hating it for what I believed it had brought me.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was the equivalent of pissing on someone\u2019s grave, and in that moment I was pissing on my own. The gold medal, the Tour de France\u2026 All of it was dead to me. The person I\u2019d been in Paris and London was dead to me too.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"BradleyBradley Wiggins, Lance Armstrong, and George Hincapie (credit: Liz Kreutz)<\/p>\n

Speaking to the Times, Wiggins praised Armstrong for flying him to the US and checking him into rehab, allowing him to finally turn the corner on his addiction this year.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s lovely. I mean, he\u2019s Lance Armstrong,\u201d Wiggins says. \u201cHe does have an ego, but he was the one who reached his hand out and invited me to America at my lowest ebb, said, \u2018We\u2019ll look after you.\u2019 Despite the colourfulness in his life\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOn a human level, he\u2019s great. When he read about the bankruptcy he said, \u2018Look, I\u2019ll write you a cheque if you want.\u2019 I said, \u2018You don\u2019t have to do that.\u2019 He was in London at the weekend. He asked me to come to the Oasis concert with him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Describing the book as part of his \u2018apology and accountability\u2019 phase of Narcotics Anonymous \u2013 \u201cI want to be the teller of my own story, good and bad\u201d \u2013 Wiggins also says he\u2019s enjoying cycling again, something he hated due to its association<\/a> with Stan Knight, the coach who Wiggins says abused him and other cyclists as teenagers.<\/p>\n

\u201cI associated every aspect of it with Stan. If I hadn\u2019t taken up cycling, I\u2019d never have met that man,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

However, Wiggins\u2019 decision to open up about the abuse he suffered two years ago, prompting many of his contemporaries to also come forward, has now changed his perspective on cycling.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love going on my bike at the weekends. It\u2019s phenomenal. That sense of escapism I had as a kid. Freedom. Yes.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sir Bradley Wiggins has claimed that Team Sky \u201cchucked me under a bus\u201d concerning the doping allegations levelled…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":191060,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[4985,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-191059","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cycling","8":"tag-cycling","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191059","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=191059"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191059\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/191060"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=191059"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=191059"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=191059"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}