Bradley Wiggins has opened up on his struggles since retiring from cycling, revealing how he was “sleeping on park benches” and even snorted cocaine off his Olympic gold medal.
"I don’t know. I don’t like to think about it,” was the 45-year-old’s response when asked how he did not die from the astonishing levels of drugs he was taking.
“I was high most of the time,” he revealed in an interview with The Times, detailing occasions he could spend up to two weeks in a hotel consuming cocaine, which could be up to 120 grams.
It was a harsh fall from grace for Wiggins. He became the first Brit ever to win the Tour de France in 2012, and followed that up with his fourth Olympic gold - after his fifth in 2016, he achieved gold in four consecutive Olympic Games, dating back to Athens in 2004.
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Compare that to just a few years later, and his addiction to cocaine had cost him his wife, his home and almost his life.
The cyclist filed for bankruptcy last year, with a company he controlled reporting debts totalling up to £1million.
Bradley Wiggins has opened up on his struggles since retiring from cycling, revealing how he was “sleeping on park benches” and even snorted cocaine off his Olympic gold medal
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He told The Times he was “out of bankruptcy, with more work than I can cope with".
“I’m earning more money than I’ve earned in the past six years. I’ve got my own house. I’m not homeless any more. A year ago, I was homeless,” he said.
He was forced into sleeping on park benches and crackhouses, or, when possible, at the home of his ex-wife. At one point, he even considered selling his gold medals.
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Bradley Wiggins won gold in four consecutive Olympic Games, with his most recent coming in 2016 in Brazil
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An extract from Wiggins’ upcoming book, The Chain, details how, at the height of his addiction, he smashed his Sports Personality of the Year trophy and resorted to consuming drugs from one of his medals.
It reads: “I raged as I smashed up my 2012 trophy for Sports Personality of the Year and my knighthood: 'This isn’t success.'
"I did that in front of my kids. No wonder there were times when they talked about trying to put me in rehab.
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"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.
"It was the equivalent of p***ing on someone’s grave, and in that moment I was p***ing on my own.
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Bradley Wiggins detailed how he smashed up his 2012 Sports Personality of the Year award
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"The gold medal, the Tour de France… All of it was dead to me. The person I’d been in Paris and London was dead to me too."
Wiggins also detailed his frustration with Team Sky during the ‘Jiffy-gate’ scandal, which involved former Team Sky doctor Richard Freeman, who received a four-year doping ban for his role in other doping cases, taking a package for Wiggins.
It brought his success throughout his career into dispute, but the five-time Olympic gold medallist continues to protest his innocence.
Bradley Wiggins became the first-ever Brit to win the Tour de France
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"There was something greater going on,” Wiggins said. “[Sky] chucked me under a bus. It'll come out."
Wiggins had previously told Cycling Weekly earlier this year: "I would love to know one way or another what actually happened. The whole story was that it was delivered to me [personally].
“I was on the podium at the end of the Dauphine, and it was made to sound like I got delivered a package."
Wiggins revealed in 2022 that he had been groomed and sexually abused by his coach when he was 13.
However, he has since confirmed he has quit his narcotics addiction, and now has his own home while being occupied with work.