Sir Bradley Wiggins has written in explicit detail about his darkest secrets, sexual abuse, the ‘murder’ of his father and that infamous Jiffy bag.
‘Wiggo’, 45, is one of Britain’s most recognisable and controversial sporting figures this century but his remarkable achievements on the bike – winning the Tour de France and eight Olympic medals – have been overshadowed in recent years.
He was declared bankrupt despite reported earnings of £13m during his career, struggled with cocaine addiction, was left homeless and his life completely unravelled since retirement in 2016.
When Wiggins stopped competing he began revisiting his past, in particular the harrowing sexual abuse he suffered from cycling coach, Stan Knight, during training camps as a teenager.
Knight gave young cyclists invasive massages, touched them in the shower under the guise of teaching hygiene and shared beds in hostels. After Wiggins spoke publicly about the abuse, four other men who were also in the Archer Road Club, in Acton, west London, came forward with similar experiences of the coach.
Knight died in 2003 and in Wiggins’ new autobiography The Chain, the cyclist describes his abuser as a ‘constant insidious figure’ for three years – between 13 to 16 – but also credits him with being instrumental in his success.
Sir Bradley Wiggins, pictured recently on a seaside bike ride, has written at length about his career and personal turmoil in his new autobiography ‘The Chain’
Wiggins has opened up on his drug addiction and bankruptcy issues after retirement
‘As difficult as it is to stomach, the confidence Stan gave me as a cyclist resulted ultimately in that prize,’ he writes.
‘He was the first person ever to make me feel that I had some worth. The person who abused me is the person who made me believe in myself.’
Wiggins also writes at length about the complicated relationship he had with his father, Gary, who abandoned him and his mother.
Gary had drug and alcohol problems and was a former professional cyclist who died in 2008 aged 55 after suffering a head injury after a house party in New South Wales.
The coroner said it was impossible to tell if the injury was caused by a blunt instrument or fall but Wiggins has ‘no doubt’ that it was murder.
He admits to constantly being ‘on tenterhooks’ about whether his estranged father would appear and blow up his life again, especially after the arrival of his two children, Ben and Isabella.
‘As hard as it is to admit, there was an element of freedom [in Gary’s death]’, he writes. But adds: ‘He remains my hero to this day. I get that it’s strange.
‘I know he let me down. I know he let a lot of people down. But my attachment to him is deep-rooted. I’m part of him and he’s part of me. And I’m glad of it.’
Wiggins and Stan Knight, the cycling coach alleged to have abused him aged 13
A young Wiggins riding his bike in a race in 1994, two years after the BCN Olympics
Wiggins also settles a number of scores in his autobiography, taking aim at former Team Sky boss Sir Dave Brailsford.
He says he regarded Brailsford as ‘like an older brother’ and thought their relationship had been ‘unconditional’.
But he realised that wasn’t the case at all, saying: ‘I felt I was disposable to him. I felt I could be rinsed of all use and chucked in the bin with the rest of the rubbish.’
He felt ‘let down’ by Brailsford and also took a swipe at the culture of Team Sky at the time. Wiggins revealed that he sent an email to an unnamed member of the team in 2012 saying he was struggling mentally with the newfound fame after winning the Tour de France and home Olympic gold in London.
He was having ‘scary thoughts’ but writes: ‘The gist of the reply is simple – “pull yourself together”.
‘Just at the point I needed some security, some hope… all I felt was ignored… I came to feel that they were pushing me over the edge.’
The biggest controversy of Wiggins’ career was the saga involving the infamous Jiffy bag. Daily Mail Sport broke the huge exclusive back in 2016.
Wiggins’ book (above) details his sexual abuse between the ages of 13 and 16
Wiggins is pictured with his father, Gary, when he was a toddler
Russian hacker group Fancy Bears had released medical information on Olympic athletes that showed Wiggins had requested and received permission to inject triamcinolone, a corticosteroid, ahead of the 2011 and 2012 Tours, and 2013 Giro d’Italia – citing asthma problems.
Triamcinolone is a powerful drug that can improve performance and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) requires a certificate or therapeutic use exemption (TUE) to use it either before or during a cycling competition.
Team Sky doctor, Richard Freeman, had asked British cycling employee Simon Cope to deliver a Jiffy Bag on June 12, 2011 to Geneva from London for Wiggins.
Wiggins did not have a TUE to use Triamcinolone so would have faced a drugs ban if that was what was in the Jiffy Bag. The true contents remain a mystery.
Team Sky said decongestant Fluimucil was in the package, which seemed unlikely because rather than a 700-mile trip, it could have been picked up at a local pharmacy.
After the UKAD’s 14-month investigation there was no satisfactory conclusion for any party – Wiggins was not pardoned or charged. In 2023, Freeman, the doctor who played a key role in British Cycling’s era of dominance, was banned for four years for doping offences.
In 2021, after a long-running medical tribunal that, at times, bordered on the farcical, Freeman was struck off having been found to have ordered 30 sachets of banned testosterone ‘knowing or believing it to be for an unnamed rider in May 2011 to improve their athletic performance’ to the Velodrome from a supplier in Oldham.
Wiggins writes a chapter entitled ‘Cheat’ in his autobiography where he addresses the Jiffy Bag saga.
‘I’m gonna have the last laugh, but not yet,’ he says an unnamed person in 2014 warned him at Manchester Velodrome.
He also says another unnamed person applied for him to have a TUE in 2015 that he was oblivious to, saying: ‘I can’t help but wonder what the motivation was to make that application other than to heap further suspicion on me at a later date.
He theorises that the who affair was used as a ‘bullet’ to get rid of him when his relationships with Team Sky members were under strain.
Wiggins thinks the Jiffy Bag could have contained testosterone patches that were the subject Freeman’s medical ban in aforementioned 2011 incident.
In 2021 the ex-British Cycling and Team Sky doctor Richard Freeman, 63, was found guilty of ordering banned testosterone ‘knowing or believing’ it was to dope a rider
‘My opinion is they sat on it for five years until, with relationships creaking at Team Sky, one of them took that information, used it as a bullet,’ Wiggins sensationally posits.
Earlier this year, Wiggins said he is now in ‘a better place’ and has settled his debts.
In 2024 the £975,000 barn he once shared with his ex-wife Cath and their children had been repossessed by a building society and sold.
And he opened up to The Times about his struggle with addiction, saying he lived in a hotel for two weeks taking cocaine, potentially as much as 120 grams, and responded when asked how he didn’t die: ‘I don’t know. I don’t like to think about it.’
‘I raged as I smashed up my 2012 trophy for Sports Personality of the Year and my knighthood, he added. ‘This isn’t success.’
Wiggins revealed he had been doing ‘s***loads of cocaine’ and became a functioning addict
‘I did that in front of my kids. No 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’s equally sad to reflect on.
‘Hundreds 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.’
He is now clean and on an even-keel again, saying of his financial plight: ‘It’s all resolved now. I’m on the front foot now. This was something that was done to me. It has all turned around. The people who are responsible are paying a heavy price for it. Fortunately, it’s all good. My life’s in a good place.’
