Bradley Wiggins and Dave Brailsford have been knighted and Sarah Storey made a dame as cyclists dominated the sporting section of the British New Year Honours list. In addition, Victoria Pendleton (CBE), Jason Kenny (OBE), Laura Trott (OBE) and Steven Burke, Peter Kennaugh, Dani King, Mark Colbourne, Neil Fachie, Philip Hindes, Craig Maclean and Jo Rowsell (all MBE) were honoured.
Wiggins became the first Briton ever to win the Tour de France this year, also adding an Olympic gold medal and several high calibre stage races to his haul. He was recently crowned BBC Sports Personality of the Year and around the same time was strongly tipped for a knighthood.
"It’s an incredible honour and an incredible thing to have," said Wiggins in a statement on the Team Sky website.
"[Sir] is not something I would like to use in daily life because it would still sit uneasy with me. The only thing I have insisted on is that my wife and children call me Sir at home but other than that everyone is free to call me Bradley!
"The goal this year was to win the Tour de France and the Olympic Games and we did that. I think it’s everything else that has happened since then, which have not been the biggest achievements but the most rewarding - things like Sports Personality and the Knighthood - because those things are out of your hands. So to be awarded those is humbling."
Dave Brailsford, as Sky's Team Principal and British Cycling's Performance Director, is also now a Sir. Under his direction, British cyclists have achieved greatness on the world stage and he has now been fully recognised for this.
"On the one hand you feel proud and honoured but on the other it feels quite humbling," said Brailsford. "I think more than anything else it’s recognition for everything that has happened in cycling, not just for this year, but over a period of time and the development of the sport. I’m the lucky one that gets recognised."
Sir Dave Brailsford
Para-cyclist Sarah Storey was the only sportswoman to be awarded a damehood. This year she won four gold medals at the Paralympic Games in London, taking her cycling tally to six and her overall gold medal count to 11, including her previous swimming medals.
Storey tweeted that she was "So proud to have been made a Dame in the 2013 New Year's Honours list. Thank you to everyone who has sent such lovely messages already! x
"Huge congrats to everyone who has received Honours in this year's list too ,a humbling way to end such an incredible year of British sport."
Dame Sarah Storey
