One Olympic cycle can make a massive difference. In late autumn 2012, the World Cup at the Chris Hoy velodrome in Glasgow bookended a summer of golden glory for British cyclists in which Sir Bradley Wiggins had won the Tour de France for the first time, Mark Cavendish had worn the rainbow jersey to great effect, and the track events at the London Olympics had been dominated to the extent that the opposition were reduced to muttering darkly about “special wheels”.
Four years on, Great Britain are again in Glasgow, where racing started on Thursday night with a team pursuit qualifying session for men and women but in a different context. The team are headless.
The post of performance director was advertised this week, six months after Shane Sutton stepped down as the coach over allegations of “inappropriate and discriminatory language” upheld a week ago by an inquiry.
An inquiry into the background to the Sutton saga is under way, and on Thursday night he indicated his intention to appeal. At the Rouleur Classic exhibition in London, he told the Press Association: “I can categorically state I never made those comments I was originally alleged to have made. I’m pretty sure people will be sitting back going ‘well, he’s going to appeal’ – which is going to happen now. I will take it from there. I will produce the evidence. Everything comes out in the dirty washing. I am quite sure the evidence this time will prevail and I will win.”
The other architect of the 2012 triumphs, Sir Dave Brailsford – who left British Cycling in 2014 – is in a precarious position at Team Sky as UK Anti-Doping investigates the delivery of a package containing an undisclosed “medical product” to the team.
It is also likely the culture, media and sport parliamentary select committee will question British Cycling in December over therapeutic use exemptions after the revelation that Wiggins had an injection of the corticosteroid triamcinolone immediately before his 2012 Tour victory and on two other occasions close to major target events; the substance was taken within anti-doping rules after a TUE and no offence was committed, but criticism has been widespread.
Finally, along with a new team head, the governing body is looking for a chief executive after Ian Drake announced he would leave in April next year.
This looks like turmoil but there is one key constant: domination of the Olympic medal table. With 12 medals including six golds won in Rio by GB cyclists, Glasgow in 2016 is a case of plus ca change, plus c’est la même chose and the riders travelled north from Manchester this week knowing as in 2008, as in 2012, the results are very much on their side whatever else is going on.
This explains why, for example, the team pursuit gold medallist Katie Archibald, the only member of the Olympic squad racing in Glasgow this weekend, feels insulated from recent events. “We are all on a high,” she said. “Every British track cyclist at Rio won a medal. It’s a big wave we can coast on for a while. The political dramas seem bizarre. As a rider you talk to your coach for the day‑to-day things and so you don’t feel any effect. You end up reading about it in the press, reading the stories and so you see it as external. That’s credit to the atmosphere at British Cycling – the riders aren’t concerned by politics, they are concerned by training. Needing a new performance director doesn’t bother me.”
This is home turf for Archibald, who comes from Milngavie on Glasgow’s north-west outskirts. She concedes readily she is “flying” after winning the women’s omnium and the individual pursuit at the European Championships in Paris and dominating the women’s events at the recentLondon Six‑Day. “I’ve done every superstitious dance I can to hold that form for this weekend. After this I have to accept that [team pursuit] training will kick in again.”
The local crowd will get to see Archibald racing the scratch on Sunday night and the Madison on Saturday, a significant moment as the two-rider relay is a new if belated addition to the women’s schedule and this is the first time a fully international field will contest the event. The weekend will also see the first running of an omnium at World Cup level under the new format, in which it is cut to one day and four endurance races, with a new discipline, the tempo race, appearing alongside the scratch, points and elimination.
Even though her strongest event, the individual pursuit, has gone, Archibald has her sights on the omnium in the long term, in spite of her team-mate Laura Trott’s dominance in the past five years: “Since I’ve been on my bike I’ve wanted to be the best. [Saying] that is something people shy away from because journalists say they want to knock so-and-so off their throne, but it’s something I will train for, that and the individual pursuit.”
Together with the team pursuiter Andy Tennant, the 22-year-old Archibald is, in terms of race experience, effectively the senior member of a youthful Great Britain team made up mainly of members of the under-23 academies. They have travelled without any up-and-coming women sprinters. Filling that gap will, no doubt, be on the to-do list of the next performance director but for the next three days racing should take precedence over politics.
