News: Start of New Foundation at Wiggins Sportive

Bradley Wiggins started and took part in the first Bradley Wiggins Foundation event (Sunday 19 August) as the cyclist looks to inspire and help others to excel at their own sports.

Bradley Wiggins and Kieran Frend (Node 4 Giordana) Â roll away from the start of the ‘Ride with Brad’ Sportive on Sunday. Photo:Â Henry Iddon

The Tour de France winner and Olympic time trial gold medallist was joined by around 1500 other cyclists at the â€˜Ride With Bradâ€™ event starting from Barnoldswick, Lancashire. The event offered 100km and 160km routes on some of the starâ€™s favourite training roads.

Speaking at the event, Brad said: â€œItâ€™s really important for me to be able to put something back into sport, and the Bradley Wiggins Foundation will become my way of inspiring and helping others to achieve their best. Supporting and taking part in todayâ€™s event is just the first step in that process.â€

Wiggins also took the opportunity to announce that he will be riding the 2012 Tour of Britain which he last rode in 2010. This comes just before the World Road Championships (Holland) where he is quoted as saying he won’t be riding the time trial and looking to add the Rainbow stripes to his Olympic Gold medal.

“He said to the Guardian newspaper “For me [it is] not big at all. I am the Olympic champion, that is the one everyone wants to win. I won’t be doing the time trial.”

Wiggins goes on to say that he’ll be there in a supporting role on a course that is noted for its climbing. “A lot of guys have ridden for me all year” he told the Guardian “and rather than just stop and say I have won what I wanted to win and go on holiday for six months and get fat, I thought it would be nice to go back there and help the team in those races.”

That said, it would not be surprising to see Wiggins ride the time trial should the temptation of racing in the rainbow stripes next year get the better of him.

Meanwhile, the debate of whether Mark Cavendish will leave team Sky now that he’s won the World road race title continues. GB and Sky boss Dave Brailsford has already said in public how Mark may need to leave the team to accomplish what he wants to as a sprinter. Team Sky will in the future the boss says be looking to go into races like the Tour de France going for the GC rather than the stage wins that is the domain of Cavendish.

All along, the goal for GB was to use the ProNat strategy that Brailsford started to work with prior to the Beijing Olympics to try and help Cavendish win the World road race championship on a course that suited him which he did and then back that up at the Olympics which the team was not able to do.

Still wearing Yellow, Wiggins and those famous side burns on show at his Foundation’s sportive.Â Photo:Â Henry Iddon

Now those events are gone, the talk of Cavendish leaving team Sky is getting ever louder. On the Yahoo news page, Wiggins is quote saying “On a personal level I have enjoyed riding with him, but I understand why he would probably have to leave.”

“I love seeing him win as much as anyone else and to see Mark back out on the Tour (de France) winning six, seven or eight different stages and challenging for the green jersey, he probably has to go”.

Cavendish has won 23 stages in the Tour de France but this year with Team Sky, the main focus was on Wiggins winning the overall and then once that was done, the team put their resources behind Cavendish with Wiggins in Yellow leading him out for the final stage win in Paris.

You can support and follow the progress of the Bradley Wiggins Foundation on Twitter @WiggoFoundation, like the Bradley Wiggins Foundation Facebook page or find out more at www.bradleywigginsfoundation.org.