Chris Froome - The Pain and the Glory - The Official Team Sky Diary of the Giro Campaign and Tour Victory

CONTENTS

COVER

TITLE PAGE

INTRODUCTION BY DAVE BRAILSFORD

THE STORY OF THE GIRO

THE GIRO ROUTE

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THE GIRO IN DETAIL

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THE STORY OF THE TOUR

THE TOUR ROUTE

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THE TOUR IN DETAIL

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COPYRIGHT

ABOUT THE PUBLISHER

INTRODUCTIONBY DAVE BRAILSFORD

Coming into Paris in the dark to seal our second successive Tour de France victory was different, that’s for sure – a special moment to savour. It was a brilliant story last year when Bradley Wiggins became the first Briton to win the greatest prize in cycling, but to return with a different leader and win in consecutive years, in the historic 100th edition of the race, created a deep sense of achievement for everyone at Team Sky.

From the outside, those three weeks that Chris Froome ultimately dominated might have looked controlled, but from the inside they felt pretty epic. After the first Pyrenean stage, during which strong teamwork enabled Chris to show his superiority, something dramatic happened every single day. There was a tremendous sense of pride for the behind-the-scenes staff in witnessing the spectacle when the riders crossed the line with linked arms on the Champs-Élysées. Going on a Grand Tour means living together 24/7 for almost four weeks. It’s like a soap opera, with a real sense of shared endeavour and camaraderie. After being in that kind of rhythm, it was wonderful to celebrate the magnitude of the occasion as a team.

In 2010 we launched Team Sky as a professional road-racing outfit with the aim of a clean British rider winning the Tour de France within five years. I said last year that you couldn’t script a more perfect way of realising this ambition than that moment on Sunday 22 July 2012, when Mark Cavendish won on the Champs-Elysées, led out by his team-mate Bradley Wiggins in the yellow jersey. That milestone Tour triumph came together in just three years, and for the team now to have done it twice – and to witness Chris Froome standing on the podium in the centenary edition alongside fivetimes winners Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain – is amazing.

There is a deep sense of community among the Team Sky outfit. As a team we worked on a very refined model in 2012, bound by our philosophy. This year we tried to scale that up and have a broader service provision so that we could have a good go at the other Grand Tours – the Giro d’Italia and the Vuelta a España. Before the season starts you look at 27 riders. Each Grand Tour only needs nine riders. The trick is to optimise resources against the goals we’ve set. Bradley’s goal for 2013 was to win the Giro. Chris’s sole objective was the Tour de France. You make plans a long way out and sometimes life gets in the way, but we put in a dynamic framework that allows us to amend plans if necessary.

We went to the Giro with pre-race speculation bubbling about whether it would be Vincenzo Nibali or Bradley first or second in Brescia. After Bradley’s unfortunate withdrawal through illness, we still achieved second on the podium with Plan B and Rigoberto Urán, which was a terrific result. You could see the team’s trademark action during the epic stage that Rigoberto won, when we used strength in numbers to go on the attack and execute a pre-planned move. The lads worked hard and Rigoberto went at exactly the right time, gaining a chunk of time with his first GT stage win in Altopiano del Montasio. We took away a lot of positives from our quest for the maglia rosa.

The 100th edition of the Tour de France meant it was a symbolic race. It was also the first since the Lance Armstrong revelations. It’s a strange situation: the sport is cleaner now than ever but, because of the revelations of past riders, it’s getting closer scrutiny and the current riders are having to take this because of the misdemeanours of the past. Reporters have a duty to ask the questions, but they also set the tone. Riders are smart enough to understand why they’re being asked, but it still doesn’t make it easy.

Otherwise, going into the Tour felt similar in many respects to last year: Chris’s brilliant run-up replicated the wins achieved by Bradley in 2012. Chris, too, hit the race as pre-Tour favourite. Instead of thinking it was our title to defend, which would have been a negative mindset, we went out to try and win it a second time starting from zero. That gave us a more positive way of looking at it. Bradley, the reigning champion, was unable to compete; Chris was coming up through the ranks, very hungry, very driven.

Chris had been second in the Vuelta in 2011, second in the Tour in 2012. Having set his sights on winning the 2013 Tour, he demonstrated an amazing growth in self-belief. He concentrated on learning how to be a race and team leader. He put himself in situations against the best riders in the world and he wasn’t afraid to take them on. When you’re riding to support a leader who can take it on, it’s a great cause. The team had difficult days, yet Chris stayed absolutely calm. He’d say, ‘No worries, we’re in control.’ The art of leadership is not to show anxiety or concern, but to do what it takes to achieve your goal. Chris proved he was the best bike rider in the race. No issue.

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THE STORY OF THE GIRO

THE GIRO ROUTE

STAGE 1

The Giro d’Italia. La Corsa Rosa . The toughest Grand Tour of them all. Never mind its bubble-gum branding, the Italian job is the Tour de France’s monster brother. The crazy one. A race that serves up brutal climbs, perilous descents, fraught finishes, extremes of weather, depths of anguish. And on Saturday 4 May 2013 – under azure skies, with Mount Vesuvius looming portentously in the background – it was Grande Partenza time, the moment the clock starts ticking and the contest begins.