How do you top the best year of your life?

Even in his wildest dreams, Sir Bradley Wiggins could not have imagined that 2012 would have panned out quite so perfectly. The first British winner of the Tour de France, a gold medal in his home Olympic Games, winner of BBC Sports Personality of the Year and a knighthood; it doesn't get any more successful than that, does it?

Whatever 2013 brings for Wiggins, it is likely to be anti-climactic in comparison to last year. This season the 33-year-old will go for victory in the Giro d'Italia, which begins tomorrow, but it is still unclear if Team Sky will allow him to defend his Tour de France crown as team leader. If Wiggins performs at his best, he is more than capable of claiming the Giro's maglia rosa winner's jersey in three weeks' time in Brescia. But is it, perhaps, unrealistic to expect Wiggins to reproduce the form that we witnessed last summer?

The 2013 season has already yielded some interesting twists and turns. Wiggins maintains that he is aiming for a Giro/Tour double which, in itself, is intriguing. Yet Chris Froome was named as Team Sky's leader for the 2013 Tour some months ago and Wiggins claimed at the time to be happy in his potential role as domestique for the race he won last July. Earlier this week, though, Wiggins was shouting from the rooftops of his desire to defend the yellow jersey, while Froome is insisting again that he has the backing of Team Sky.

There is little doubt that Wiggins has a burning desire to win Italy's Grand Tour: to have won all three Grand Tours is cycling's Holy Grail. The damage that Lance Armstrong did to cycling is not confined to the doping controversies in which he was embroiled. The American's laser-like focus on the Tour significantly devalued the remaining two Grand Tours, the Giro and the Vuelta a Espana, while elevating the significance of the Tour to a disproportionate height.

Just how strong is Wiggins' motivation for the Giro this year, though? When you consider that his hand is, perhaps, being forced somewhat regarding his schedule and given that his achievements of 2012 are unlikely to be surpassed, it would be understandable if he wasn't quite "up for it" this year.

There was something of an Olympic hangover epidemic in the aftermath of London 2012. Jessica Ennis, Jason Kenny and Jade Jones are just three of the Olympians who admitted that they were struggling for motivation. Indeed, my own decision to retire was largely fuelled by the knowledge that nothing I did in my badminton career from there on in would surpass competing in a home Olympic Games.

No athlete who was part of Team GB will experience anything close to the atmosphere that was created for those two magical weeks last summer.

Wiggins himself has conceded that it took him a considerable amount of time for him to rediscover his motivation following his glorious victories last year. He claims that his desire has now returned and he is as hungry as ever, but the proof of that remains to be seen. It will be evident in his performance over the next three weeks if he is, indeed, in a similar state of mind to that of 2012. It certainly cannot have been easy for him to regain that level of motivation when you consider what he is required to put his body through day in, day out.

The life of a professional athlete may seem to be something of a cushy number. Being paid to ride a bike, run round a track, or skip around a badminton court for a few hours a day is an opportunity that many people would happily give their right leg for.

But it is not as comfortable as it may appear: the hours of tortuous training when you feel like your lungs are going to burst and the lactic acid in your legs feels like it will never dissipate. The constant travelling. The continual monitoring of your diet. It is far from a walk in the park, which is why if Wiggins has not rediscovered his motivation entirely, then he will quickly be exposed.

Certainly, the form that Wiggins has shown in his races so far this season suggest that he is not yet firing on all cylinders. In fact, he hasn't won a race since the Olympic time trial on August 1 last year.

This may not necessarily be a consequence of a loss of motivation that he admitted to: all of his races this year have been warm-up races to aid his preparation for his assault on the Giro. But for Wiggins' 2013 season to be deemed a success, he must be wearing that maglia rosa on May 26.

Does Wiggins have the motivation to be as successful this year as last?

How do you top the best year of your life? Even in his wildest dreams, Sir Bradley Wiggins could not have imagined that 2012 would have panned out quite so perfectly. The first British winner of the Tour de France, a gold medal in his home Olympic Games, winner of BBC Sports Personality of the Year and a knighthood; it doesn't get any more successful than that, does it?

Whatever 2013 brings for Wiggins, it is likely to be anti-climactic in comparison to last year. This season the 33-year-old will go for victory in the Giro d'Italia, which begins tomorrow, but it is still unclear if Team Sky will allow him to defend his Tour de France crown as team leader. If Wiggins performs at his best, he is more than capable of claiming the Giro's maglia rosa winner's jersey in three weeks' time in Brescia. But is it, perhaps, unrealistic to expect Wiggins to reproduce the form that we witnessed last summer?

The 2013 season has already yielded some interesting twists and turns. Wiggins maintains that he is aiming for a Giro/Tour double which, in itself, is intriguing. Yet Chris Froome was named as Team Sky's leader for the 2013 Tour some months ago and Wiggins claimed at the time to be happy in his potential role as domestique for the race he won last July. Earlier this week, though, Wiggins was shouting from the rooftops of his desire to defend the yellow jersey, while Froome is insisting again that he has the backing of Team Sky.

There is little doubt that Wiggins has a burning desire to win Italy's Grand Tour: to have won all three Grand Tours is cycling's Holy Grail. The damage that Lance Armstrong did to cycling is not confined to the doping controversies in which he was embroiled. The American's laser-like focus on the Tour significantly devalued the remaining two Grand Tours, the Giro and the Vuelta a Espana, while elevating the significance of the Tour to a disproportionate height.

Just how strong is Wiggins' motivation for the Giro this year, though? When you consider that his hand is, perhaps, being forced somewhat regarding his schedule and given that his achievements of 2012 are unlikely to be surpassed, it would be understandable if he wasn't quite "up for it" this year.

There was something of an Olympic hangover epidemic in the aftermath of London 2012. Jessica Ennis, Jason Kenny and Jade Jones are just three of the Olympians who admitted that they were struggling for motivation. Indeed, my own decision to retire was largely fuelled by the knowledge that nothing I did in my badminton career from there on in would surpass competing in a home Olympic Games.

No athlete who was part of Team GB will experience anything close to the atmosphere that was created for those two magical weeks last summer.

Wiggins himself has conceded that it took him a considerable amount of time for him to rediscover his motivation following his glorious victories last year. He claims that his desire has now returned and he is as hungry as ever, but the proof of that remains to be seen. It will be evident in his performance over the next three weeks if he is, indeed, in a similar state of mind to that of 2012. It certainly cannot have been easy for him to regain that level of motivation when you consider what he is required to put his body through day in, day out.

The life of a professional athlete may seem to be something of a cushy number. Being paid to ride a bike, run round a track, or skip around a badminton court for a few hours a day is an opportunity that many people would happily give their right leg for.

But it is not as comfortable as it may appear: the hours of tortuous training when you feel like your lungs are going to burst and the lactic acid in your legs feels like it will never dissipate. The constant travelling. The continual monitoring of your diet. It is far from a walk in the park, which is why if Wiggins has not rediscovered his motivation entirely, then he will quickly be exposed.

Certainly, the form that Wiggins has shown in his races so far this season suggest that he is not yet firing on all cylinders. In fact, he hasn't won a race since the Olympic time trial on August 1 last year.

This may not necessarily be a consequence of a loss of motivation that he admitted to: all of his races this year have been warm-up races to aid his preparation for his assault on the Giro. But for Wiggins' 2013 season to be deemed a success, he must be wearing that maglia rosa on May 26.