Sir Bradley Wiggins was knighted in the 2013 New Years Honours for services to cycling after becoming the first British winner of the Tour de France in 2012. Representing Team Sky, Wiggins took charge of the overall classification and, with it, the signature yellow jersey, after stage seven, a 199km course from Tomblaine in northeastern France to the summit of La Planche des Belles Filles in the Vosges Mountains, in which he finished third to teammate Chris Froome. Two days later, Wiggins recorded his first Tour stage win, on stage nine, a individual time trial over 41.5km between Arc-et-Senans and Besancon.
Wiggins maintained his lead for the remaining stages of the race and finally secured victory by winning the nineteenth, and penultimate, stage, another individual time trial over 53.5km between Bonneval and Chartres. He punched the air as he crossed the line, safe in the knowledge that, barring accidents of the final, 120km stage – effectively a ceremonial procession – from Rambouillet to the Champs-Élysées in Paris the following day, he would win the overall classification. That he did, completing the twenty-stage, 3,497-kilometre race 3 minutes and 21 seconds ahead of Sky teammate Chris Froome.
In an outstanding year, Wiggins also won the Paris-Nice race and the Criterium du Dauphine, the two biggest races in France after the Tour de France, the Tour de Romandie in Switzerland and a gold medal in the time-trial event at the London Olympics. Wiggins retired from cycling in late 2016 but, two years later, a report by the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) select committee stated that he, and Team Sky, has ‘crossed an ethical line’, by using drugs that, while allowed under World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) rules, were intended to boost performance, rather than treat medical need, in preparation for the Tour de France.