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news
Shane Sutton (picture source Team Sky 2013)Jess Varnish "shocked and upset" as it emerges British Cycling investigation cleared Shane Sutton on eight out of nine charges
British Cycling upheld just one of nine charges relating to allegations made by track sprinter Jess Varnish against former Great Britain Cycling Team technical director Shane Sutton, it has emerged.
Varnish, who competed at the London 2012 Olympics in the team sprint with Victoria Pendleton – the pair won world championship silver in the event in 2011 – has said she is “shocked and upset” at the news, which she has described as “heart breaking,”
In October, the governing body upheld Varnish’s complaint against the Australian, saying he had “used inappropriate and discriminatory language,” and expressed its “sincere regret that this happened.”
> British Cycling upholds Jessica Varnish’s allegation of discrimination against Shane Sutton
But according to a letter obtained by BBC Sport’s Dan Roan, just one of the nine charges laid against Sutton – namely, that he used the word “bitches” – was upheld.
The charges against the 59-year-old, who has previously said he plans to appeal against the decision, fall under two broad headings – allegations of discriminatory conduct, and bullying.
The letter obtained by BBC Sport, reveals he faced three charges of having used “derogatory and offensive language” – namely, “bitches,” “Sheilas,” and “use of the c word’.” Only the first was upheld.
Also under the heading of alleged discriminatory conduct were “alleged discriminatory conduct” about Varnish’s age and gender. Those were that he told her to go and have a baby, and that he branded women as being difficult. Neither was upheld.
Two other charges fell under that heading – that equipment was not distributed equally among male and female riders, and that there was discrimination in terms of careers after a rider left the Olympic Podium Programme. Again, Sutton was cleared on both.
The other two charges related to alleged bullying by Sutton, one in relation to Varnish’s body weight, the other to the decision to end her participation in the Olympic Podium Programme. Neither was upheld.
All of which begs the question why British Cycling announced last month, without qualification, that it had upheld Varnish’s complaint, especially since the separate UK Sport-ordered investigation which was due to report in October is still ongoing.
Certainly, Varnish, who turned 26 last month but is no longer on the Great Britain Cycling Team squad of funded athletes, was taken aback by the news that Sutton had been cleared of all but one of the charges.
The Worcestershire-born rider told BBC Sport: “I am shocked and upset by this latest news and have instructed my solicitors to appeal the findings of the internal investigation on my behalf.
“Having provided substantial evidence to back up my complaints, to now learn that the majority were not upheld, is heart breaking. I know what was said, and I know I’ve told the truth.”
She added: “I have requested from British Cycling the full investigation report to understand why the weight of evidence presented by me and others wasn’t sufficient for the board to uphold my complaints.”
Her lawyer, Simon Fenton, insisted that the way British Cycling had conducted its investigation had harmed both parties.
He said: “Jess Varnish is demanding to see the report produced by British Cycling which they are releasing in dribs and drabs.
"They have managed to satisfy neither Jess nor Shane Sutton and to embarrass themselves in the process.
"Everyone needs to see the full report to understand how they came to their conclusions and to challenge them if appropriate."
While some of Team GB’s gold-medal winning cyclists at the Rio Olympics, including Ed Clancy and Joanna Rowsell-Shand, have backed Sutton, British Cycling’s decision in October suggested there was no way back for him.
Sutton is understood to be on a shortlist of seven people for the vacant role of High Performance Director at Cycling Australia.
> Sutton shortlisted for Australian performance director role
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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48 comments
As my HR Manager missus always says... banter is banter is banter... right up until thre is a fall out, and then that banter is evidence, mud that can be thrown your way.
Personally speaking I sympathise with all parties in this matter... Jess' perception is she was short-changed and abused, and I have every faith in the fact that that perception was genuine.
I believe that SS approach was effective, genuine, and what he believed to be the most effective way to get the most out of the athletes under his care. I do not believe it was his intention to make anyone feel bullied, singled out etc.
I believe BC were naively sitting back, assuming that everyone was on the page with the management style being employed... that someone wouldn't call foul should things not go the way they personally wanted. Now that someone has, they have a choice... rip up the manual and start again, with a professional, fully PC environment, or look to make the whole thing go away as quietly as possible.
I know what I would do in their situation, and I'm sorry to say it is exactly what they have done.
It doesn't look good on Jess Varnish, because she only complained after not being selected, suggesting that she's motivated by bitterness. That doesn't make the allegations untrue of course.
The comparisons in the comments here to child sexual abuse in football are a bit extreme and unnecessary though.
Ultimately these are charges of workplace bullying/ sexism, one of which stuck, so I guess Jess and the others have been vindicated to an extent. Sacking Sutton goes with the territory of sport and sport management: one day you're in a job, the next you're not, in Jess's case it was performance-related, in Sutton's case due to inappropriate conduct.
I guess BC just needs to move on as best it can now. Nobody's indispensible, but it seems one party has a harder time accepting it than the other in this case
They're not being used along the lines of 'it's almost as bad as what's going on in footbal!'. Nor is the claim being made that if you let the BC culture fester it'll end up in a paedo ring.
The comparisons are being used to counter the argument that you just shrug your shoulders, put up with it and crack on, because that's the culture here. 'Don't rock the boat' has been shown up to be a pretty shit, and at times, insidious, management style.
No you're wrong by mention alone the subtext is exactly that, if left unchecked, it would end up in something nefarious, why else mention it?
For exactly the reasons I said, which is why I chose those words in that sequence.
Sutton wasnt sacked, he resigned
No senior person in any organisation is ever sacked. It is generally recognised that a sacking is bad PR for both parties, so it is always a resignation. Even if money needs to change hands to convince the other part that resignation is in their best interests.
I bet he left the seat up in the unisex toilets. That's probably the cause of all this. Or didn't refill the kettle after using it. Men.
LOLOLOL.
Number crunching;
Complaints about SS by JV before she was not selected = 0
Complaints about SS by JV after she was not selected = 9 (or thereabouts)
She lost her job/funding because of her own lack of performance. The 'scorned woman' therefore tries to lay the blame elsewhere and ensure that someone else loses their job as a result.
Despite the fact that 8 out of 9 complaints against SS were dismissed she appears to have been successful in her objective. Shame.
Yeah.... The only minor flaw in that analysis is quite a few other cyclists backed her up. If she was just randomly casting aspersions you'd expect her to be left on the sidelines with no back-up, no?
It is quite possible that her motivation for complaining was the realisation that she wasn't having her last punt at the Olympics. Had Vicky Pendleton experienced the same thing, maybe she'd've been the one to complain - who knows.
That in itself doesn't undermine her complaints: it just makes her seem a medal-driven hypocrite - like most athletes, probably. It is entirely feasible that she is a medal-driven hypocrite with valid complaints about the head coach.
If you want to persuade people you're right, it would be advisable not to use the phrase 'scorned woman'. It makes you sound like the knuckle-dragging misogynist you evidently are.
Also, counting is not 'number crunching'.
HTH.
This whole thing going public was the crime in all this.
JV not getting in the team for whatever reason, be it personal or performance based is what it is. In most team sports anyone being benched by the manager for personal or professional reasons doesn't raise more than an eyelid. If JV went public becuase of this reason, then that's poor IMO. If she went public because she was being 'ignored' by BC, OR had no one to escalate her complaint to, then going public is sort of okay, where else could she go, ACAS?
If Sutton was/is this 'wild Aussie' then not being managed properly is totally on the people above Sutton at British Cycling. If he offended peolpe he should be accountable. He should also have been dealt warnings, given chance to change and only then should be asked to leave. I think most people 'want to like Sutton' he comes across as a passionate coach and reminds me of coaches I've known and how I percieve coaches are probably wrongly, but im my very limited experience they are blunt and a bit rude to everyone, if you slack off or not give your best you'd get singled out for it and roasted.
Sutton going or being pushed won't be the end of the world. Maybe he is 'out of his time'. There are others who can get the best from athletes, I just hope that the desicion to push Sutton to another team won't bite us in the arse and that in four years we dont get beat by the Aussies. Because that would be a real kick in the muff.
I keep thinking of Alex Furguson thowing that boot at Beckham in the changing room and cutting his eye, I had to google it, but that was in 2003. That's GBH in the eyes of the law. I can't imagine Sir Alex being very 'office acceptable' and watching his language or actions 'behind the scenes'.
the crime in this is thinking sports coaches are above the law.
and tbh, suggesting it all should be kept under wraps, in the weeks following the revelation about violence and abuse in football is shows how thos crap is allowed to fester.
And also demonstrates why people are afraid to speak out .
I wonder how much we buy into the image of the ruthless winner on the track and really nice, sweet, calm, and relaxed person off the bike?
I bet some of these people are constantly driven and hell to live with.
If we could reverse the decision to remove JV from the team and she had competed at Rio. It would have denied Katy Marchant her medal.
That is the difference between coaching athletes for an olympic sport and general workplace practices where doing your best is generally more than good enough to keep your job.
The headlines are about the language and attitude of SS but I get the distinct feeling that was no polite way of telling JV that she was on longer good enough. We had two spots at Rio and came back with two medals by athletes both younger than JV.
If you believe Nicole Cooke in her autobiography he wasn't interested in women's cycling at all.
However, on the other side there's a few people with British Cycling who don't like Nicole Cooke (or Emma Pooley).
How many teams did Nicole ride for ? She doesn't seem to have been the easiest person in the cycling world to get on with though ?
None of us know who is telling the truth...though everyone likes to guess, and thats wrong.
The only thing I'll say is why did no one complain about him before? Why didn't she say something before she found out she wasn't selected? And the same for the others backing her up - why didnt they make things better for everyone earlier...by putting a stop to it by making an offical complaint sooner? The bullying may have been so bad they were scared to, in which case more than one head must roll here.
I dunno. But there are two alternatives: 1) which is that Varnish is basically making the whole thing up because she's a millenial feminist and is backed up by other people because they're Politically Correct; 2) sportspeople are generally biddable conformists who put up with a lot of unpleasant stuff because they want to be famous and rich.
It seems that the bar for putting up with abuse is pretty high if the varied revelations about swim coaches, soccer coaches and children's entertainers is to be believed.
spot on Ush.
Only 2 people know what happened and what was said.
If either are lying then they have to live with that.
I'm not going to judge either.
She'd have been shocked and upset if she'd not a got a medal.
Then people would have been asking why did she get selected, was the weeding out process not tough enough.
Once entitlement creeps into sport it's over. Sport is still one of the last bastions where everyone's not a winner and that's why people like it.
complaints about discrimination and bullying arenothing to do with entitlement, except the entitlement to a fair chance,and a workplace free from bullying and harassment.
Great shame. One woman's bitterness about not being selected has ended up causing a world-class coach losing his job. Worse still he will likely end up taking our 'medal-factory' formula to one of our main competitors. Well done Varnish.
Are you for real - it wasn't just Jess Varnish making these claims was it? If being a 'medal factory' requires bullying, discrimination at the cost of £4.1m per medal then Australia is welcome to it.
Pursuit of medals over all else is pointless.
If ‘GB’ never wins a track cycling medal again I couldn’t care less.
Sutton was cleared of all charges except referring to some women as 'bitches'. Big deal. He's a fucking Australian for Christ's sake ... that's what they do.
This is the sharp end of competitive sport ... tempers rise and sometimes (non-pc) things are said in the heat of the moment. Tough. Either get with the programme or stay out of the kitchen.
Fuck off and seek out your 'safe space' snowflake. I'll take Sutton, his dedication and his pursuit of maximising the performance of true winners every day over whiny losers who don't have what it takes to be winners.
No, this is not acceptable in the office, it is not acceptable in the home, it is not acceptable at the shops and it is not acceptable in sports!
Would we accept a White South African trainer in the UK calling a black cyclist "Nigger" because "that's what they do"?
Robust Aussie credited with putting in place a top-class British sporting factory. Ruffles feathers; has to quit.
Sound familiar? British Swimming 10 years ago. A radically updated and more professional training, nutrition - lifestyle - regime was implemented and they've been much more successful since. And in swimming's case, they did really have 1 Aussie to thank for a massive shake-up - there was no Dave Brailsford to Bill Sweetenham's Shane Sutton.
The cycling machine is in place now; losing one boss or coach should have little impact - if he's done a good enough job in being involved in its setup in the first place, he should effectively have made himself redundant. That leaves a risk that, actually, some newbies have joined a well-polished machine with different expectations, and now he is the anomaly. There's only one direction for him to go, no matter how many times it's proved that he actually did say 'Fuck' or 'bugger', or 'sheilas', 'babies' or 'wobblies'. He's surplus to requirements.
1. I think you're crediting Shane Sutton with too much.
2. There is life after Dave Brailsford so there'll be life after Shane Sutton.
3. The world has moved on: there'll be plenty of 'snowflakes' waiting for him back in Oz, if he takes that gig.
4. British Cycling is at the top of its game and the top of the world. When you look at the achievements in so many disciplines from 2012-2016 it's a dominant one. We're unlikley to hold that dominance for much longer, whether Shane Sutton is still a honcho or whether he takes over somewhere else. To blame that on us ditching one person would be simplistic to the point of being wrong.
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