Now it’s official: Bradley Wiggins is bankrupt and will have to return over 1 million euros to his creditors. To do so, the court seized all his assets, including the titles he won and especially the Olympic medals, which will be auctioned.
Now it’s official: Bradley Wiggins has been declared bankrupt by the English court for an enormous debt of one million euros, never paid after his companies went into receivership last November to meet the many creditors. The former winner of the 2012 Tour de France and five-time Olympic medalist between track and road, is now at the wall: all his assets have been seized and will be auctioned off. Among these, also the medals of the Games which will be sold to the highest bidder to exceed what the English simply defined “a load of s**t that others have thrown at me that I now have to deal with somehow.”
Sir Bradley Wiggins was a true English national hero and still today the most decorated British Olympian ever, yet in the last ten years his life and career have taken a nosedive right from the saddle with the former cyclist being declared failed failing to repay the creditors who have taken him to court since 2020, without ever obtaining any compensation. Now, the final act: everything linked or attributable to Wiggins has been seized and will be used to try to collect the sum accumulated over the years, equal to over one million euros.
Wiggins’ defense: “A lot of s**t in my name”
The English ‘baronet’ has always supported a constant defensive line over the years which, however, has never allowed him to raise his head financially: Wiggins immediately denounced that all his economic problems were caused by people who exploited the popularity of his name, in fraudulent and false investments in which he then found himself having to face swarms of creditors. “My financial problems have been going on for some years without my knowledge, caused by negligent people who exploited my name without telling me. It is a historical matter involving professional negligence on the part of others. There are already a number of legal action from my lawyers… there are people who left a lot of shit with my name on the front page, which now I have to deal with in any way”
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Assets seized, Olympic medals up for auction
For Wiggins the time has come to pay off his enormous debt and the court has already imposed the path to follow: all the assets attributable to the English champion will be seized and then auctioned to the highest bidder to recover as much as possible from the million debt. Among these there are also the 5 Olympic medals which make Wiggins the most awarded Briton of all time at the Games.
- 2004 – Athens Games: gold, team pursuit
- 2008 – Beijing Games: gold, individual pursuit
- 2008 – Beijing Games: gold, team pursuit
- 2012 – London Games: gold, time trial
- 2016 – Rio de Janeiro Games: gold, team pursuit
In addition to the Olympic successes, other material will be put on sale, taking it from an immense career in which Wiggins also boasted seven World Championships (one on the road, 6 on the track) and a Tour de France, in 2012.
All Wiggins’ troubles, how he ended up bankrupt
Since retiring from all forms of professional cycling in 2016, Wiggins has lived a dark history of summons and trials at the High Court on the doping front, as well as having had to deal with a complex divorce and then ongoing financial problems leading up to the current bankruptcy. In 2018, an investigation into Wiggins conducted by the Digital Culture Media and Sport committee involved the former champion in a dark-sided doping story, for the use of the controversial drug triamcinolone, accusations from which he was later acquitted due to insufficient evidence .
Problems that also affected Wiggins’ private life which he faced in 2020 the controversial divorce with his wife Cath, met at the age of 15 and mother of his two children. Another tile that undermined the stability of Wiggins who had to simultaneously face the poor management of their affairs: in the same period, in fact, his company, Wiggins Rights Limited, entered voluntary liquidation in 2020, owing its creditors more than 350,000 euros. A debt that was never repaid and which in November 2023 reached over one million euros.
