News: Thomas wins BBC Sports Personality of the Year

From Junior World Champion in 2004 to Tour de France winner in 2018, Geraint Thomas wins BBC’s Sports Personality of the Year

News: Thomas wins BBC Sports Personality of the Year

From Junior World Champion in 2004 to Tour de France winner in 2018, Geraint Thomas wins BBC’s Sports Personality of the Year

The Team Sky rider Thomas topped off a fantastic 2018 by seeing off the likes of Lewis Hamilton and Harry Kane to win the prestigious award in front of a packed audience at the Genting Arena in Birmingham this evening. As a two-time Olympic champion on the track, Thomas consolidated his impressive palmares in July this year by becoming the first Welshman to win the Tour de France.

Thomas becomes the fifth cyclist in history to win the BBC Sports Personality of the Year award, with Tommy Simpson (1965), Sir Chris Hoy (2008), Mark Cavendish (2011) and Sir Bradley Wiggins (2012) having also won the accolade since the awards began.

In 2019, a former British Road Race Champion, Thomas had a stellar year winning the British Time Trial Road Championships along with two stages of the Tour de France along with the overall. The season also saw him win the overall at the Critérium du Dauphiné, second overall in the Volta ao Algarve and 3rd overall at Tirreno–Adriatico.
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The popular Welshman who we’re told can’t drive down the road in his home country without being waved at or asked for selfies, said after winning “I take great pride in representing Britain and Wales. It has been a great year for British sport and long may it continue.”

Thomas – who was presented with his award by 2017 winner Sir Mo Farah – is the first Welshman to win Sports Personality since footballer Ryan Giggs in 2009. “I really should have thought about what I was going to say,” a shocked Thomas said. “I feel very lucky to have come into cycling when I did. I just went down to the local leisure centre for a swim and instead I rode my bike.”

“As a bike rider, I always focus on myself. Obviously people want me to win, but hearing stories like Tyson [Fury]’s and Billy [Monger]’s, you realise that what we do does inspire people back home. To see people on their bikes and enjoying it, you take just as much pride from that as winning something like this.”

‘G’ won Wales Sports Personality of the Year 2018 earlier this month. His Tour de France victory came in his ninth appearance – one fewer than the record for most appearances before winning. He won two stages of the Tour, including stage 12, which included the famous Alpe d’Huez climb, and wore the Yellow Jersey for the final 11 stages. Thomas was the first Welshman to win the Tour and it was the sixth time in seven years a Brit had won.