Bigham, 32, a key member of Ineos Grenadiers, has excelled as a performance engineer, combining his exceptional time-trialing skills with innovative aerodynamic approaches. He joined the team in 2022 in the R&D department, filling an important role in the long-standing British team.
A career on and off the track
Previously, Bigham started as an aerodynamicist for Mercedes F1 and later founded the Huub-Wattbike team, surpassing national teams at track World Cups. After being rebuffed by the British Track Cycling Team, he helped Denmark win Olympic silver at Tokyo 2020 and briefly held the hour record.
He will compete on the track at the Paris Olympics and spoke to the Telegraph about his decision to leave the WorldTour team.
Lack of support for Olympics
“It’s not particularly a me versus Scott [Drawer, the team’s performance director] thing at all,” Bigham said an interview with the Telegraph. “It’s more about how I see performance. How I want to approach performance isn’t aligned with how Ineos wanted to do it. I wanted more autonomy and the ability to act on my ideas, which I wasn’t really getting at Ineos.”
When asked if the situation resembled that of British Cycling a few years ago, Bigham agreed. “I feel that a lot of performance is being left on the table, which frustrates me because it’s clear we should be doing things a lot better. Let’s be honest, Ineos are not where they want to be, not where they need to be, and the gap is not small.”
Decline of Ineos
The team has not been dominating as they did in recent years. As both Sky and Ineos Grenadiers, the team won seven Tours de France, with the last victory in 2019 when Egan Bernal won. They also took the Giro in 2021.
Bigham also expressed frustration with the lack of promised support for his Olympic bid. “They always said they’d support me for the Olympics,” he said. “And by February, I was asking, ‘Guys, what is the support?’”
Frustrated with team’s attitude
The support ultimately fell short of his expectations. “Eventually, Scott came back and said, ‘Our offer is you can take three months off as unpaid leave from May through to the Games,’ which was okay in a way. It put me on a UK Sport APA, and I can argue I’m a professional athlete, which is a nice box to tick. But at the same time, it didn’t feel like substantial support,” he said. “With everything else building as frustration within the team, it felt like if that’s the approach…
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