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Bradley Wiggins faces the press in London. Tim Ireland/PA Wire/Press Association Images
High hopes

Bring it on: Wiggins confident ahead of time trial

‘This is going be a piece of piss now compared to [the Tour]. It’s just an hour and not three weeks.’

BRADLEY WIGGINS HOPES to carry his Tour de France-winning form into the time trial at London 2012 as he seeks a fourth Olympic gold.

The 32-year-old Londoner became the first British winner of the Tour’s yellow jersey, the victory owing much to his proficiency against the clock as he won the stage nine and stage 19 time trials by significant margins.

Wiggins does not believe the Tour or Saturday’s 250-kilometre road race, in which he worked tirelessly and fruitlessly in support of Mark Cavendish, will have an impact on his individual bid to overtake Sir Steve Redgrave as the British Olympian with the most medals.

“The Tour is such a good boot camp for this,” said Wiggins ahead of tomorrow’s 44km test, where he will be seeking to become the first man to win the Tour and Olympic gold in the same year.

“This is going be a piece of piss now compared to that. It’s just an hour and not three weeks. It’s been the best preparation. That’s the baseline of worst-case scenario of pressure and expectation, with three weeks lying ahead of you. And we handled that pretty well, so an hour time trial to make history should be a doddle.”

Wiggins, whose first assessment of the 44km Hampton Court route took place yesterday, believes his 53.5km stage 19 win in Chartres, which all-but confirmed his Tour triumph, was the best performance against the clock of his career.

“The benchmark is there from Chartres,” he said. ”Nothing is going to change from that performance. I have 100 percent faith in the training Tim (Kerrison, the Team Sky coach) has set me. I’ve done enough now to realise that it is not all suddenly going to collapse on Tuesday night and that I’m going to be a pile of shit on Wednesday.

“My performances have been so consistent all year and I’ve no reason to think that is going to change.”

Wait a minute: Why was that Japanese coach handing a wad of $100 bills to a gymnastics judge?

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