Wiggins tackling a new career at Dubai sevens

Dubai: After conquering the Tour de France, winning Olympic time trial gold and becoming heavy favourite to be named Britain’s top television sporting personality of 2012, Bradley Wiggins now claims to have mastered another, slightly less taxing, discipline — waterboy at the Dubai Rugby Sevens.

“I was just lugging water bottles around. I was bloody good at it as well,” the 32-year-old boasted to media following Thursday’s first day at The Sevens Stadium.

Wiggins — the first ever British winner of the biggest race in cycling following his July success — was roped in to carry out the menial duty for the Joining Jack team as part of his support for the charity of the same name. He flew in for a 48-hour stay to help the team, which boasts a host of rugby stars, including union World Cup winner Jason Robinson and League legend Martin Offiah.

Joining Jack won all three of their matches in the international veterans’ class on the opening day – 24-5 against Gulf Legends, 38-0 over Richmond Swansea Heavies and 10-5 against Bali Legends. And how much of that was down to Wiggins? “Most of it,” he joked. “I mean, someone’s got to carry the water.

“But what started out as a bit of fun for them, you could see as the day went on just how serious they were taking it. Jason Robinson was really vocal about how he wanted them to be playing. A lot of that competitiveness you could see was coming back and it was quite physical by the end. I’m sure the boys will say they want to go all the way.”

However, Wiggins was to be disappointed when the team lost 25-0 to Xodus Steelers on Friday afternoon.

The charity the Team Sky rider is supporting aims to raise money and awareness to help tackle a terminal degenerative disease called Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD). It was formed by former rugby league player Andy Johnson after his four-year-old son Jack was diagnosed earlier this year.

Wiggins and Johnson are near neighbours in Eccleston, northern England, and the cyclist has been supporting the charity since it was formed in May. It just so happens that Wiggins’ profile has sky-rocketed in the intervening six months, but that hasn’t stopped him supporting the cause. He even described the injuries he suffered when getting knocked off his bike while training recently as ‘a blessing in disguise’ as it meant he had the time to come to Dubai with Joining Jack.

“Before my life changed dramatically with the Olympics and the Tour and everything, I was already supporting this charity. It was something that was a continual thing and obviously, with my success, if that helps it even more then that’s fantastic,” Wiggins said.

“The reason I got involved in the first place was I have children myself. Such small gestures in this charity, such as the Joining Jack symbol [linking together your two index fingers like two js], can go such a long way when you’re doing it somewhere like the podium on the Tour de France.

“It’s been hard since the Olympics — I’m being pulled left, right and centre and manipulated into a lot of things I didn’t really want to. But I had an accident three weeks ago, got hit by a car, and then everything stopped. I had a doctor’s note for a couple of weeks so I could actually sit and pick and choose what I wanted to do, and this is something I really wanted to do.

“The injury has been a blessing in disguise in some ways as otherwise I probably wouldn’t have been here due to how hectic it would have been.”

Johnson, a Dubai regular who even got married here, is delighted with the boost Wiggins and the rugby stars have given to the charity.

“It [celebrity endorsement] has given us the leg up that we needed — it puts us in the papers and on the TV. With Bradley joining us and being very supportive as he has been, it does give us a really good start and an opportunity to take this not just locally, but nationally and internationally,” the ex-Wigan Warriors player said.

“We’re going to keep banging that drum, and the more awareness the better. We’ve come a long way since being set up in May.

“But we come home from rugby tournaments today and have all these big dinners, but Jack’s still there and the situation’s still here so we’ve got to raise as much money as we can, as quickly as possible, to further the good research that’s going on at the moment.”

For more information on the charity, log on to joiningjack.org.