Bradley Wiggins says he may Tour no more

BRADLEY Wiggins admitted that he is unlikely to race the Tour de France again as he scales down his ambitions in response to advancing years.

Bradley Wiggins

BRADLEY Wiggins admitted yesterday that he is unlikely to race the Tour de France again as he scales down his ambitions in response to advancing years, after a disastrous Giro d'Italia and the progress of younger team-mates - and rivals - within Team Sky.

Wiggins still has significant targets, including the time-trial at the World Championships in Tuscany in September, but his acceptance that his historic yellow jersey of 2012 cannot be repeated poses the question of whether the knight of the road has competed in his last Grand Tour.

At 33, Wiggins is on the downslope and says that he will now seek his victories where the motivation takes him, to fit in with his family - and with the pragmatic acceptance that he has been overtaken by younger men.

The baton at Team Sky has passed not only to Chris Froome, who is favourite for this year's Tour de France, but also Richie Porte, the Australian who may well join his team-mate on the podium next month to confirm his potential as a serious top-level contender.

Wiggins has spent recent weeks recovering from his knee injury and the wounded pride sustained at the Giro and, instead of defending his yellow jersey this summer, he accepts that his Tour days almost certainly concluded with that triumph last year, the first for a British rider.

"For me it was always about winning the Tour," Wiggins said. "That was a huge thing for me, a huge journey; I've been doing that for years. I don't know if I'd want to go through all that again, to be honest.

"I don't think I'm prepared to make those sacrifices again that I made last year, with my family and so on. I've achieved what I've achieved and I'm incredibly happy with that."

Wiggins has two children and, in a sign of shifting priorities, has missed an altitude camp this year in order to spend more time with his family.

At 28, Froome is five years younger than Wiggins. After months of tension between the pair, which reached such a level of distrust that it became impossible to imagine them as team-mates, the older man has accepted the rise of the next generation.

Wiggins spent months this year talking up his chances of a Giro-Tour double, but acknowledged yesterday that Sky had a new leader on the road who might yet raise the bar for British cycling.

"Chris has really stepped up, he's delivered now and he looks like he's really going to be there for a few years to win a few Tours maybe," Wiggins said. "There has been a natural selection this year through Chris's performances and my performances that he warrants being the team leader. And if he wins the Tour, that continues through to next year. I can live with that.

"If I do anything else after this, it will be stuff I want to do, stuff that I'm willing to train hard and sacrifice for. I've always had other goals and there are other things I'd like to try and do."

Wiggins is expected to return to racing in the Tour of Poland from July 27.

He is also targeting the Tour of Britain in September, claiming: "That's a race I've always wanted to do well in. It's getting bigger every year and in terms of profile in this country it's a nice thing to do well in."

Wiggins will be cheered around the country for his extraordinary achievements on the track and the road, culminating in 2012 with his double of the Tour and victory in the London Olympic time-trial.

Compared with those unprecedented highs, 2013 has been an annus horribilis, but Wiggins will hope to redeem his season in that world championship time-trial in Florence.

That race will not mark the finale, with Wiggins contracted to Sky throughout 2014, but it might be the beginning of the end of a great career.