Chris Froome, a four-time winner of the Tour de France, has revealed that he accidentally pushed a fan into a canal during his ambassadorial work at this year’s race.
Forty-one-year-old Froome, who officially confirmed his retirement from the sport earlier this month, returned to the Tour to work with car manufacturer and race sponsor Skoda, a position that former race winner Andy Schleck used to do until he joined Lidl-Trek’s management.
Froome’s daily tasks involved hosting guests on a morning group ride, before taking them to the stage’s start and providing analysis and insight.
Latest Videos FromCycling Weekly
One morning, however, Froome found himself swimming after a client’s footwear. “It was a gentleman from Turkey who was having trouble with gears,” Froome said in a wide-ranging interview (not limited to ‘canal-gate’) with The Telegraph’s Tom Cary.
“He hadn’t done much riding before. I leaned over, touched his shifter, and he went into a massive wobble, crashed over my back wheel, rolled down the embankment and into the canal.
“Plop.
“I dropped everything and went in after him. He was already clinging to the bank by the time I got down there. I had to go and retrieve his shoe which was floating away.”
The rest of the Tour has been less hazardous for Froome, whose last race was the Tour of Poland last August before he suffered a second life-threatening crash while training.
It was his fifth season racing for Israel-Premier Tech, who he joined in 2021 after 11 years representing Team Sky and latterly Ineos Grenadiers
Those who succeeded Froome as the sport’s pre-eminent general classification riders, Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard, have had to face the same questions and doubts that Froome did in his career. Namely, credibility over their performances.
Riders from at least five teams, including Pogačar and Vingegaard, were made to provide an anti-doping sample in the middle of the night during the race, the first time that the International Testing Agency (ITA) has performed such tests. To get permission, the ITA had to prove “serious and specific” suspicion that the targeted athletes “may be engaging in doping.”
“It is something that, as riders, I just think we have to embrace,” Froome said of the night-time tests. “Of course, it’s not much fun being woken in the middle of the night, particularly as a GC rider who has to perform every day.
“And perhaps it was a contributory factor in Jonas’s crash [on stage 15] – there’s no way of knowing for sure. Maybe the fairer way of doing it would be to do everyone, rather than just two guys.
“But yeah, our doors always have to be open, regardless of how inconvenient it is. To inspire confidence and to act as a deterrent.”
Froome in action at last August’s Tour of Poland – his last ever race.
(Image credit: Getty Images)
During his reign as the Tour’s undisputed champion, Froome was regularly jeered by French fans at the Tour who disliked the dominance of the Briton and Team Sky. He even had urine thrown at him.
“We had some pretty hair moments – death threats, all kinds of things which were never made public,” he revealed.
Froome tested positive for the prohibited asthma drug salbutamol at the 2017 Vuelta a España – which he won – but he was cleared by the UCI and WADA of any wrongdoing nine months later. There were also accusations of Team Sky exploiting Therapeutic Use Exemptions (TUEs) for certain medications.
The seven-time Grand Tour winner admitted that he could understand why fans were cynical of his performances. “I think because I was the next guy after Lance Armstrong was charged [with a litany of doping offences in 2013], even though he had won the last of his Tours years earlier, I think that definitely came with a level of scepticism.
“I definitely blame a lot of the French commentators at the time, who were speaking on public television and saying things like, ‘I can’t believe what I’m watching here. This looks like US Postal all over again, Lance Armstrong 2.0’.
“It was a perfect storm. I completely understand why we got the flak we did. But it was fascinating for me to see that the moment I returned to the Tour after my injuries in 2019, the amount of support I had. I actually have a really good relationship with the French public now.”
Asked if he is confident that Pogačar’s results will stand the test of time, Froome said: “Because of my personal experiences, it doesn’t sit well with me that people accuse someone just because they’re the best.
“I can’t speak for him. I don’t know how he’s training. All I can say is from the outside, it’s super impressive what he’s doing. And just from my experience, how the testing works, how I’m still having samples retested now, that gives me confidence.”
As for what’s next, Froome ruled out a job in management with any professional team. “I feel as if I can do more, potentially at grass-roots level,” he said. “Maybe something linked to being over in Kenya, where I grew up.”
Explore More
