Five-time Olympic cycling champion Sir Bradley Wiggins has revealed he snorted cocaine off his London 2012 gold medal at the height of his drug addiction.
Sir Bradley won the 2012 Tour de France race, becoming the first Brit to do so, and won gold for Great Britain at both the 2012 and 2016 Olympic games.
But after retiring from cycling in 2016 following his Olympic success, Sir Bradley fell into a cocaine-fuelled drug addiction.
Speaking to The Times ahead of the release of his upcoming autobiography The Chain, Sir Bradley opened up about a range of topics, including his addiction and recovery, and sexual abuse he'd experienced as a child.
In an extract from his book, the 45-year-old cycling great recalled the moment he snorted cocaine off his gold medal as "mocking" his achievements, saying the medal and Tour de France win "were dead to me".
He even "facetimed a fellow user" during that moment, to show “how funny" he was.
Sir Bradley revealed he smashed up his knighthood and his trophies in front of his children, ended up in a "crack house in Middlesbrough", and appeared "totally manic" on live TV after drug binges.
"The reality of cocaine is finding yourself hunched in a toilet cubicle, knees in someone else’s piss, snorting a line off a lavatory seat," he said.
He said he was now sober and in recovery, but was fearful of relapsing.
"If I had three pints now and then someone put a line in front of me, I would probably... Well, I don’t know. But I don’t drink anymore."
The autobiography also detailed the sexual abuse he said he suffered at 13 from his coach Stan Knight – experiences which pushed Sir Bradley away from cycling for years. Knight died in 2003 without facing justice.
He said he was now "back in love" with the sport.
"I love going on my bike at the weekends. It’s phenomenal. That sense of escapism I had as a kid."
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