Sky rider was unsure of results before Olympic time trial
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Chris Froome (Great Britain) on the podium(Image credit: Daniel Simms)
Chris Froome (Great Britain)(Image credit: Sirotti)
Chris Froome (Great Britain) gets the countdown(Image credit: Daniel Simms)
Chris Froome (Great Britain)(Image credit: Daniel Simms)
Olympic time trial podium (L-R): Tony Martin (Germany), 2nd; Bradley Wiggins (Great Britain), 1st; Chris Froome (Great Britain), 3rd(Image credit: AFP)
After taking bronze in the men's time trial in the 2012 London Olympics on Wednesday, Chris Froome confirmed that he would start the Vuelta a Espana in the coming weeks. Froome finished second in the race last year behind Jose Cobo, and claimed second in this year's Tour de France. However the upcoming Vuelta represents Froome's first opportunity to ride as a GC leader at Team Sky, having supported Tour winner Bradley Wiggins in the last two grand tours the pair have ridden together.
"I will be lining up at the Vuelta in just two weeks time so I'll take a day off tomorrow and soak up some of the Olympic spirit around London and then I'll go back to Monaco and start training and focus on the Vuelta," he said.
Froome's Olympic medal was somewhat overshadowed by Wiggins' success, with the Tour winner claiming gold to ensure that he is now Britain's most successful Olympian of all time. However Froome's ride backed up his strong Tour, where he finished second to Wiggins twice in the time trials, and second overall.
But coming into the race Froome admitted that his result was by no means guaranteed, with a number of strong contenders and little success in one-day time trials.
"I knew my form coming out of the Tour was good but doing a one-day time trial like today is always different to doing a time trial during a grand tour when everyone is really tired. I've never really had a decent result in a one-day time trial so I wasn't sure what to expect. Also being quite a flat course doesn't really play to my advantage too much here.
“So I was coming in here a little bit open minded, saying to myself I would do go as hard as I can and hopefully sneak into the medals. To come away with a bronze and know that Bradley won the gold, I don't think we could have asked for much more.”
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Daniel Benson was the Editor in Chief at Cyclingnews.com between 2008 and 2022. Based in the UK, he joined the Cyclingnews team in 2008 as the site's first UK-based Managing Editor. In that time, he reported on over a dozen editions of the Tour de France, several World Championships, the Tour Down Under, Spring Classics, and the London 2012 Olympic Games. With the help of the excellent editorial team, he ran the coverage on Cyclingnews and has interviewed leading figures in the sport including UCI Presidents and Tour de France winners.
