Bradley Wiggins to attend trauma counselling in Utah funded by Lance Armstrong

Bradley Wiggins has revealed that he is travelling to the United States to attend a trauma counselling clinic in Utah, with Lance Armstrong paying the bill on his behalf.

The Telegraph reports that Wiggins made the disclosure during a talk at the Barbican in York earlier this week. Wiggins has struck up a friendship with Armstrong in recent years, and he was a regular guest on the American’s podcast during this year’s Tour de France 

“I’m off to America on Friday. He [Armstrong] has paid for me to go and see a top trauma counselling clinic in Utah so I’m looking forward to that,” Wiggins said. “He’s offered me a role back in cycling, a platform which doesn’t involve me getting on a bike.”

Wiggins recently published his latest autobiography, The Chain, in which he recounted details of the sexual abuse he suffered as a teenager at the hands of a cycling coach. The book also outlines Wiggins’ struggles with cocaine addiction.

Speaking to the BBC earlier this year, Wiggins defended his friendship with Armstrong, who was stripped of his seven Tour de France titles and banned for life for doping in 2012. 

“He’s been a great strength to me and a great inspiration to me, and it’s on a human level. Lance has been very, very good to me,” Wiggins said.

“That’s not something everyone wants to hear because people only like to hear the bad stuff. You can only take someone how they treat you and Lance has been a source of inspiration to me and a constant source of help towards me and is one of the main factors why I’m in this position I am today mentally and physically, so I’m indebted to him for that.”

In an interview with L’Équipe in April, Wiggins had already indicated his willingness to follow a course of therapy recommended by Armstrong.

“He has lived some complicated moments himself,” Wiggins said. “He told me that this therapy had changed his life. It lasts a week, you spend ten hours a day in a room, without a phone, without anything. I don’t know what awaits me. We’ll see.”

Armstrong has previously supported Jan Ullrich during his well-documented issues with alcohol and drugs, with the German later saying that his old rival had helped to bring him “back to life.”