Brailsford: Key link in the chain gang

Columnist and Senior Features Writer

Sunday 22 July 2012

WHEN Mark Cavendish powers up the Mall in the Olympic road race, as Sir Chris Hoy and Victoria Pendleton step out beneath the bright lights of the velodrome and Bradley Wiggins, fresh from Tour de France glory, goes up against the clock around the streets of Surrey in the time trial, there will be a single common thread that binds them all: David Brailsford.

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By Susan Swarbrick

As British Cycling's performance director, Brailsford is the man credited with turning around the country's fortunes on the track, road, in BMX and mountain biking. In pop-culture terms, he is perhaps the sport's equivalent of Simon Fuller, the svengali figure who propelled the Spice Girls to global fame.

Brailsford himself prefers to be compared to a conductor in an orchestra, overseeing the many components involved in British Cycling and ensuring they come together in flawless – and tuneful – cohesion. His record speaks volumes. Under his eight-year tenure British Cycling have enjoyed their most successful era, one in which Hoy has racked up four Olympic gold medals, and Pendleton and Wiggins have a clutch of world and Olympic titles between them. Not to forget the fortunes of Cavendish, an alumni of the British Cycling Academy who is world road race champion and tipped for gold in London. Brailsford, too, is the man at the helm as principal of Team Sky who will see the first British man – Wiggins – step atop the Tour de France podium in Paris today.It is hard to imagine that in 2004, when he replaced Peter Keen as performance director, Brailsford was a relatively unknown name in cycling circles. Born in Derby and a keen amateur cyclist whose passion for the sport was ignited on family holidays to France, Brailsford studied sport science and psychology at university and later gained an MBA.His early career saw him work as a business consultant in the perfume industry, before he got a foot in the door of cycling in 1993 as a soigneur – masseuse, handler and all-round dogsbody – for a small pro cycling club and later the British national team. From there he began his steady climb through the ranks to where we stand today. Richard Moore, a former cyclist and author of Sky's The Limit: British Cycling's Quest To Conquer the Tour de France, has spent considerable time with Brailsford and knows the man better than most. "Dave is a curious mixture of appearing laid back, but actually being fairly obsessive," he says. "Attention to detail is his big thing. He conveys this sense of calm, but that doesn't always give a true indication of what's going on inside [his head]. It's like the classic metaphor of the swan gliding gracefully across the surface of the water, but paddling furiously underneath. "He is a people person. He always talks about having an athlete-centred approach where, in his words, the 'athletes are kings and queens' with everyone else there to support them. That philosophy runs through British Cycling and Team Sky." Brailsford, 48, has astutely surrounded himself with a team of loyal lieutenants, including head coach Shane Sutton, former British Cycling's U23 Academy and now Team Sky coach Rod Ellingworth, and resident psychiatrist Steve Peters."Dave is very good at building a team," says Moore. "He talks about 'compassionate ruthlessness'. He's let people go if he's felt they aren't contributing or they are a negative influence in some way. "He has been good at picking people who you wouldn't necessarily choose to do the jobs they do. Steve Peters was a psychiatrist working with individuals with serious mental health problems in a high-security hospital, so to bring him into a sport environment was definitely leftfield thinking. To appoint Rod Ellingworth was an inspired move; he has gone from a journeyman professional bike rider to become one of the world's best coaches."Shane Sutton is a complete maverick. He is completely unpredictable, but has great strengths which include lack of ego and putting the athletes first."At the Beijing Olympics in 2008, British Cycling claimed eight gold medals, including seven in the velodrome. It also saw the sport begin to truly prick the public consciousness. In London, cycling's burgeoning profile looks set to eclipse that peak. And, in that, perhaps lies Brailsford's biggest legacy.

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Brailsford: Key link in the chain gang

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