Books and DVDs Bradley Wiggins: My Time; Tom Danielson’s Core Advantage; Louis Garneau: Never Give Up

In My Time, Bradley Wiggins’s second and most recent autobiography, the cyclist goes to great lengths to portray himself as an “ordinary bloke” who despises the celebrity culture that has enveloped the Western World – people being famous despite not having achieved anything. “Wiggo” has, of course, achieved much in his 33 years.

The book traces the buildup to his sublime 2012 season in which he became the first Briton to win the Tour de France before winning the Olympic time trial gold medal. Clearly a patriot, he describes this Olympic victory as his greatest sporting achievement. He exudes pride when recounting the fact he was able to capture gold in front of fellow Britons and to receive the medal at Hampton Court, one of England’s historic sites.

Wiggins is an enigma to many and is likely a handful to manage because of his nonconformist ways. His sharp tongue and profanity- laced comments in the media – and in this book – have often stirred the pot. One might point to his difficult childhood as the root of his peculiar personality.

Born in Ghent, Belgium, he and his mother were abandoned by his father, Gary, a hard- drinking Australian pro cyclist, when Bradley was an infant. “Gary didn’t so much walk out on us Christmas 1982 as throw us out,” Bradley writes. “I wasn’t even two years old. We’d gone from our home in Ghent to visit my mum’s parents and he called my mum to say she and I weren’t to come back to Belgium.” They returned to England and moved in with his grandparents where his grandfather, George, became his father figure. George’s death was to prove a pivotal moment in Bradley’s life.

A self-described straight shooter, he devotes an entire chapter on the effects that decades of doping culture has had on cycling. He also goes into detail of how he extracted himself from a Garmin contract to sign with Britain’s Team Sky, whose ambition it was to have a British rider win the Tour de France within five years.

My Time

is an insightful memoir written with brutal honesty; although, the detailed stage-by-stage account of some of the racing sometimes drones on a bit too much. An enjoyable read nonetheless.