Controversy over Team Sky drug use threatens to overshadow Wiggins' last UK race
Sir Bradley Wiggins will start his last race in the UK on Tuesday before he retires, as questions over his use of banned steroids before three major races including his Tour de France victory threatens to overshadow the occasion.
The row erupted over the decision by Team Sky to seek permission for Wiggins to use triamcinolone for medical purposes.
UK Anti-Doping is also investigating allegations of wrongdoing in relation to a package delivered to Team Sky at the end of the Criterium du Dauphine stage race won by Wiggins in June 2011.
Wiggins has done nothing wrong, but as the Olympic velodrome is dressed to welcome him for the London Six Day, unanswered questions still remain in the air.
Peter King, a former boss of British Cycling who helped turn the sport's fortunes around, believes Team Sky is straying close to areas it said it wouldn't.
Speaking to ITV News Sports Editor Steve Scott, he said: "It may be a question of using the rules to your best advantage, but I think it's still a case of living within the rules.
When asked if greater transparency over the mystery delivery in 2011 would help alleviate the crisis, he added: "Probably yes. If it was perfectly innocent then let's know about it."
In 2012 Wiggins became the first British rider to win the Tour de France. He also won time-trial gold on the road at that summer's Olympic Games in London, and his team pursuit gold on the track in Rio in August was his fifth Olympic title and British record eighth medal.
Data stolen by computer hackers after the Rio Games revealed he received three therapeutic use exemptions for triamcinolone - a substance which has a history of abuse in cycling and is otherwise banned - on the eve of the 2011 and 2012 Tours and 2013 Giro d'Italia.
Wiggins and Team Sky principal Sir Dave Brailsford have strenuously denied any wrongdoing, insisting each time the TUEs were medically necessary to deal with a pollen allergy that aggravates Wiggins' long-standing asthma condition.
The TUEs also had the approval of the UCI, cycling's world governing body, and there is no suggestion that Wiggins, who left Team Sky in April 2015, or the team have broken any rules.
Stephen Fry, an adviser to two current Team Sky riders, told ITV News that he's concerned that while the controversy rumbles on, the whole team is tainted and its future feels less secure.
"The way that this is handled and the communication of it is so important because we're not just talking about a team's reputation here, we're talking about 31 riders and probably the same sort of number of staff members.
"They in effect have their jobs on the line."
British Cycling announced over the past week that chief executive Ian Drake will leave his post next April. Drake has insisted his departure after a 21-year association is not linked to the recent controversies.
British Cycling is now recruiting for a chief executive and a first performance director since Brailsford quit in April 2014 to concentrate on Team Sky.