Sir Bradley Wiggins gets personal on Desert Island Discs

Sir Bradley Wiggins, four-time Olympic champion and the first Briton to win the Tour de France, says the influence of his parents was a big factor in his achieving a hugely successful career – but for very different reasons.

On today’s edition of the BBC Radio 4 show Desert Island Discs, Wiggins spoke of the sacrifices his mother had made to help launch him on the road to stardom, but he also says his father’s decision to leave his young family was also crucial in shaping the way his life turned out.

Wiggins, who is targeting Alex Dowsett’s Hour record next month and the team pursuit at the Rio Olympics next year, also told the show’s host, Kirsty Young, that he still put his body through the rigours of competing at the highest level “because I love it, really,” something he says took three years to appreciate after the heady summer of 2012.

He was born in Ghent, Belgium, where his father Gary was a pro cyclist on the track circuit. He left the family and moved back to his home country, Australia, when the future Olympic and Tour de France champion was just two years of age, however.

Wiggins recounted how after he reached the age of 18, he did re-establish a relationship with his father, initially over the phone, although the pair did meet prior to Gary’s death in 2008.

"If he had stayed around through my teenage years I wouldn't have been a cyclist because he would have been so hard and so critical of me.

"I would have packed it in and gone and done something else," he said.

While Wiggins is very close to his own children, Ben and Bella – their initials are tattooed on his thumbs, something for him to focus on in time trials, including when winning the world championship in Ponferrada last year – his own experience as a child is different.

He told Young that his own father "did not fully see the responsibilities of having a child," adding that he distributed drugs to other pros, hiding them in his infant child’s nappies.

"He did a bit of everything. In those days it was amphetamines and speed. His nickname was Doc. He was a user and used to sell.

"My mum's got some great stories about the people who, when I was a baby, came through our apartment door to buy stuff off my dad. These people are now beating the drum saying 'I didn't do anything', which is funny."

He spoke about the support his mother gave him once his father walked out.

"She was quite a strong woman and I think she just lived for me from that moment on really. She wanted me to pursue my dreams.

"My mum put herself into £50,000 worth of debt to service my sporting career. I look after her now but she is not the sort of woman who wants a lot in return.

"She's just content and proud that I've held a marriage for 12 years and that I've got two kids - that I've got the fundamental things."

Wiggins also spoke of how a meeting with his idol, Paul Weller, at their tailor, persuaded him to accept the knighthood offered to him in the wake of his Tour de France win and victory in the Olympic time trial at London 2012.

The fame and money that has come with those and other achievements contrasts with his experience after he won his first Olympic gold medal in the individual pursuit at Athens in 2004 – where he also won silver in the team pursuit and bronze in the Madison for a rare full set of all three colours.

"I thought there'd be people banging down the door with cheques for millions of pounds. I was Olympic champion but couldn't pay the mortgage,” he explained.

"I had this incredible guilt that I was Olympic champion but couldn't pay the bills. I got a bit depressed about the whole thing. It did not live up to the impression of what I thought Olympic gold was all going to be about.

"That was August. As soon as my son was born in March, I felt like I had to provide for this person and it brought back the memories of what happened with my own father," added Wiggins, who will attempt to break Alex Dowsett’s Hour record next month.

The show is worth listening too, and while we won’t spoil it for you, there are a couple of perhaps surprising choices of music in there; you can catch up with it here.