Cycling: Bradley Wiggins on crash course to glory
BRADLEY WIGGINS starts this weekend’s Tour of Italy owing a debt of gratitude – to the driver who knocked him off his bike.
He just went back to Majorca, got back on his bike for a normal stint of reality, nobody around, no paparazzi.
That is the verdict of his Team Sky boss Sir Dave Brailsford.
Brailsford believes the accident – he was hospitalised and treated for bad bruising after being knocked off his bike outside a Lancashire petrol station in November – was the wake-up call Wiggins needed to help him focus after his Tour de France and London Olympics success.
Brailsford said: “The moment that van hit him, all the commercial things, he didn’t do anything.
“He just went back to Majorca, got back on his bike for a normal stint of reality, nobody around, no paparazzi. That really was timely.
“It might have been painful for him at the time, but whoever that woman driver was did him a massive favour, she’ll never know.”