Contador’s pain sock.
Vuelta a Espana winner Alberto Contador has decided to auction off the sock he stuffed into his mouth to fight the pain of home surgery on his fractured tibia.
The saliva-covered athletic sock has been carefully washed, dried and folded and reunited with its mate sock and will to sold to the highest bidder, with proceeds to benefit the children’s hospital Infantil Universitario Niño Jesús in Madrid.
Contador, now the winner of six grand tours, was forced to use his sock to muffle his screams of pain as a medical assistant César Flores opened and cleaned his leg wound without the benefit of an anesthetic — other than a pain numbing injection in the surrounding area.
News of the Contador sock auction has spread on social media throughout Spain and the rest of the cycling world with potential buyers already naming prices. To jumpstart the bidding, Contador’s Tinkoff-Saxo team owner Oleg Tinkov has made an initial offer of 5000 Euros for the famous sock.
Team Sky owner Rupert Murdock is also bidding for the sock and was supposedly quoted as saying that if his man Froome couldn’t beat Contador in the Vuelta then at least he would get a piece of the Spaniard one way or another.
Inspired by the Contador sock item auction for charity, several other riders from the recent Vuelta have also donated items. His Saxo-Tinkoff teammate Ivan Rovny has donated the slightly broken pair of sunglasses that Gianluca Brambilla broke in their boxing match on stage 16.
Not to be outdone, Movistar’s Nairo Quintana will donate the bike seat that exploded off his time trial bike after he slammed into a guard rail and crashed out of the race.
Nevertheless, it’s the sock that has everyone’s attention. The auction begins on Saturday, September 20th at 1oam Madrid time. The bidding will also be streamed live from Spanish website Marca.com with Contador himself displaying the sock and demonstrating how he stuffed it in his mouth to fight the pain.
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