Bradley Wiggins has done an extensive sit-down interview in an effort to explain why he availed of therapeutic use exemptions.
Bradley Wiggins has said while he understands in the post-Lance Armstrong era why news of his TUEs would prove controversial he could not understand why many observers were immediately convinced his were performance enhancing.
In an interview with The Guardian newspaper in the UK, he described much of the news reporting on the issue as “sensationalised”.
He insisted he suffered from extreme allergies that were so bad he felt like he was “breathing through a straw at times”.
He also attempted to explain the absence of any mention of his allergies or his TUEs in his 2012 book My Time because he was basking in the glory of his best season and Tour de France win.
Advertisement
“I was paranoid about making excuses; ‘Ah, my allergies have kicked in.’ I’d learned to live with this thing,” he said of never mentioning his condition.
“It wasn’t something I was going to shout from the rooftops and use as an excuse, and say: ‘My allergies have started off again’ - ‘That’s convenient, isn’t it Brad, your allergies started when you got dropped.’
“I didn’t mention it in the book. I’d come off a season of … I’d won everything that year. When I was writing the book I wasn’t sat there thinking: ‘I’d better bring my allergies up.’
“I was flying on cloud nine after dominating the sport all year. It wasn’t something that I brought to mind.”
Related News
He explained he suffered from asthma from the age of 15 years and noticed how bad his allergies were in the 2003 Giro. That was his first big stage race and he suffered “a noticeable difference to performance … When I had a severe attack, the day after I was wiped out.”
And when asked about how serious the allergies were he said: “Uncontrollable sneezing, runny nose, watery eyes, the urge to rub my eyes constantly, and in doing that the eyes becoming bloodshot … extreme. My breathing became restricted, like breathing through a straw at times.”
He said he had for many years tried to control the condition with over the counter products.
“Continual medication... two Clarityns per day, one in the morning, one at night, nasal sprays, inhalers – two in the morning, two at night, eye drops as and when. I was on the maximum for over the counter products.”
You can read the interview with Wiggins in The Guardian by following this link.
And you can read the full transcript of the interview by following this link.
The Russian Fancy Bears hacking team published details online three weeks ago of the TUEs granted to a large number of star athletes from across a range of sports.
Team Sky leader Chris Froome and former leader Wiggins were on that list, though details of Froome’s TUEs had been known about before the leak.
However, when it emerged Wiggins had availed of TUEs for injections of corticosteroid triamcinolone acetonide before the Tours de France in 2011 and 2012 and the Giro d’Italia in 2013 questions were raised about the ethics of the applications.
Some of those who have used the drug in the past, including David Millar who has served a two-year drugs ban, said the substance caused rapid weight loss of up to 2kg and increased power.
Topics
