Gom october issue 01 chris froome

Chris Froome THE WINNER WE ALL KNOW

From Kenya,

to South Africa, to England,

to Victory

Even though Chris Froome is quite adamant that he is a true Brit, South African and Kenyan cycling fans are justified to be excited about his Tour de France victory.

Photo By: St. John’s College

It was in Kenya, under the mentorship of David Kinjah, that his apprenticeship as a cyclist started off. He then came to South Africa where he first joined Hi-Q Super Cycling, followed by Konica Minolta and Barloworld. Only then did he move on to Britain and Team Sky. Froome matriculated at St. John’s College in Johannesburg, earning a distinction in his favourite subject, mathematics.

It is rather amusing how attitudes can change sometimes. In Froome’s biography (Va Va Froome) an incident is related that happened

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Game On Magazine, October: Issue 01, 2013

10 years ago when Froome was still a pupil at St. John’s College. He was pulled over by an irate traffic officer for taking a cheeky shortcut while he was riding home from boarding school down a busy Johannesburg highway to spend the weekend with his dad. Despite Froome’s polite protestations the patrolman failed to see the merit of his argument. In the beginning of this year, while Froome was doing interval training along the R27 highway on the Western Cape coast near Saldanha Bay, he was chased down

by the police again and ushered to the roadside.

But this time there was no angry ticking off. It transpired that the constable, an ardent cycling fan, just wanted to have the honour of shaking Froome’s hand. While he was a pupil at St John’s, Froome played flank for one of the school’s lower rugby teams until Grade 11.

“I was getting crunched,” Froome recalls, “but I enjoyed it. Actually I loved it.”

ATHLETE PROFILE FEATURE: CYCLING

He also won a race at an interhouse cross-country athletics meeting. Alan Lion-Cachet, Sport Director at St. John’s, remembers Froome as a boy who took on every challenge that came his way.

‘He was never one who tried to duck and dive responsibilities.

He did more than what was expected of him. He even asked me if he could start a cycling club at the school.”

In his Matric year in 2003, Froome was elected Nash House Prefect. At that time cycling was already the only sport for him. He could be found in his dormitory room, pedalling at a furious tempo on his racing bike that was mounted on a turbo trainer. Allan Laing, Nash housemaster, remembers that Froome would cycle for hours on end.

“He must have cycled hundreds of kilometres without leaving the room, showing true dedication and passion for the sport.”

Later on he ditched the indoor rollers and headed off on long distance solo rides in the late afternoon, returning when it was already getting dark.

“We would often begin to worry about him, wondering whether he was OK,’’ Laing said.

THE WINNER WE ALL KNOW… One of his favourite training climbs used to be on Munro Drive, adjacent to St. John’s College.

According to Froome, it looks like a speed hump compared with the mountain passes that he now uses to prepare for events like the Tour de France. It was at St John’s that Froome also had his Tour de France initiation when he watched the 2002 Tour on television in his dormitory.

Game On Magazine, October: Issue 01, 2013

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Photo By: Zoon Cronje

Chris Froome THE WINNER WE ALL KNOW

SIDE BAR

Chris Froome

Chris Froome (Team Sky) won the one hundredth edition of the Tour de France.

The question on everybody’s lips is whether Froome’s victory will turn out to be the much needed breaking of a new dawn in international cycling. If early indications that this is indeed the case can be believed, the change could not have come at a better time.

Armstrong, possibly the worst cheat of all time in international sports, admitted earlier this year that he had used banned substances to win the Tour. This was the last missing piece of the doping jigsaw puzzle and probably represented the darkest era in international cycling.

However, Froome is still standing firm on his principles. He reiterated that, in his opinion, his victory is the beginning of a new era in cycling.

If ever international cycling needed a ‘clean hero’, now is the time.

When Armstrong won the Tour in 1999, after the 1998 Festina Doping scandal, he was hailed as the new saviour of international cycling.

“We, as a peloton, are standing together for the first time and we will not tolerate the use of banned substances any longer.”

The fact that Armstrong survived cancer and came back from the brink of death to win the Tour, which is considered to be one of the most strenuous physical challenges in the world, was perceived as a fairy tale come true.

Dave Brailsford, team manager of Team Sky, backed his rider by saying that Froome’s victory was the beginning of a transition period in international cycling.

Froome was on record right from the start saying that he was going to prove that the Tour could be won without having to resort to the use of any banned substances.

“Young riders such as Geraint Thomas, Marcel Kittel, Peter Sagan, Nairo Quintana, Andrew Talansky and many others, have not been around at the time when doping was a serious problem in cycling.

Since erythropoietin (EPO) became the drug of choice among cyclists in the early 90s, the sport has made media headlines for all the wrong reasons.

During the past 17 years basically not a month has gone by without reports in the media about a cyclist having tested positive for illegal substances.

It is a sad and frightening fact that from 1996 (the end of the Miguel Indurain era) to 2010 no fewer than six Tour de France champions were caught using banned substances.

The culprits were Bjarne Riis (1996), Jan Ullrich (1997), Marco Pantani (1998), Lance Armstrong (1999-2005), Floyd Landis (2006) and Alberto Contador (2010).

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Game On Magazine, October: Issue 01, 2013

Unfortunately the media, perhaps rightfully so, has been somewhat sceptical about Froome’s performance throughout the Tour. The barrage of questions about doping that Froome had to face were probably more strenuous to him at times than having to ride up the legendary Alped’Huez climb twice in one day.

“I am proud to have won the Tour, showing that the sport can change for the better.”

“As far as I am concerned, the sport is in a very good position at the moment. A brilliant future awaits it.”