After nearly 20 years as a professional cyclist, Geraint Thomas OBE announced this week that he is retiring from the sport. The 38-year-old Welshman chose this season as his last and the Tour of Britain in September will be his final race. “It looks highly likely that it will finish in Cardiff, which is where I’m from, so it will be a nice full circle moment,” he says.
Thomas has won two Olympic gold medals, three World Championship titles in the team pursuit and cycling’s greatest prize of all, the Tour de France in 2018. So why retire now?
“I wanted to do it early enough in the season to just enjoy it with everyone knowing it’s my last,” he explains. “I’ve been doing this for 19 years and it’s got to end at some point. I never thought I’d be cycling this long, to be honest. I didn’t want to be the grumpy guy on the bus who should have retired the year before.”
It has been something of a long goodbye for Thomas, who hinted he would retire at the end of this year when he signed his most recent two-year contract with Ineos Grenadiers in 2023.
Funding cuts in Ineos and Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s sporting empire have been well-documented, most recently hitting football hard. But Thomas insists this did not play into his decision to retire. “I know Ineos are super-passionate about cycling and Jim [Ratcliffe] loves his cycling. It certainly was not a part of my decision to stop.”
Now Thomas is thinking about what comes next. “I’m definitely aware of the fact that I’m going to need something to do, physically and mentally,” he admits. “I’ve always woken up each morning with a goal. If I didn’t have that I would definitely struggle.”
Ultimately, he is keen to find a way to remain connected to cycling. “I’d love to stay in the sport and with the team,” he says. “I’ve grown up with this team and will speak with the guys and see how they think I could fit. I feel like [an advisory role] adds some value from a performance angle, but who knows?”
He is also keen to try new sports, such as a triathlon, but “nothing too competitive” – adding that maybe, just for fun, he’ll take up golf. “Obviously that’s not going to give me the same thrill as racing my bike. I just need something to excite me, because that’s what I’m used to.”
Right now, Thomas is also embracing the world of broadcasting. His hugely popular podcast Watts Occurring, which he co-hosted with retired cyclist and fellow Welshman Luke Rowe, is now part of Geraint Thomas Cycling Club, a podcast he started in 2021 with his co-host Tom Fordyce, which takes listeners through the biggest stories in the sport.
If that sounds niche, Thomas says it’s meant to be. “It’s for people who are already into cycling and it will help them enjoy it even more,” he says. “If you don’t know the sport I think it’s quite hard to get into this pod, but people do really love it for that.”
Listeners even meet up and cycle together in Geraint Thomas Cycling Club jerseys. In November, 1,500 fans packed into Manchester’s Lowry Theatre for a live recording. “It’s mad. People always ask me about it at races. Everyone says: ‘I love the pod, G.’”
What makes his podcast unique is that it is the first hosted by an active cyclist. “We were recording when we were fighting for a win at the Giro d’Italia last year. When you are still performing in the world’s biggest races and you can across get your own points about the races, that’s special.”
It all started from humble beginnings. “Me and Luke started out on our beds with a £100 mic during the Tour de France [in 2019],” he says. “It was just a way of getting our opinions out there unfiltered. I still forget with Tom that we’re sending it out to the world and we’re not just sat in a pub, chewing the fat about a bike race.”
Competing in a sport as gruelling and relentless as professional cycling, Thomas hasn’t had much time to reflect on his achievements, until now. Can he name a highlight? “The Tour de France win is still the biggest,” he says. His yellow jersey glory happened 11 years after his first entry to the race – when he finished 140th out of 141 cyclists.
“With the Olympics, I won gold with my teammates and with [Ed] Clancy, one of my best mates. We were super-close as a team in both Beijing and London. But with the Tour, it’s just you on that step and I just felt the aftermath was so much bigger. That really changed my life.”
As a proud Welshman, meanwhile, and an avid rugby fan, watching Wales on a losing streak has been “tough”. “It’s just disappointing to see the guys struggling,” he says. “Purely from an athlete point of view you know for sure they don’t want to be losing. They want to win, and it’s tough to watch.” How does he feel ahead of Wales playing Ireland in the Six Nations on Saturday afternoon? “That’s not going to be good. No, I’m kind of happy I’m racing that day. So I won’t have to watch it.”
With his retirement in mind, Thomas is using his podcast to look to the road ahead. “I’m learning all the time and this is giving me a midway house to practise a skill when it comes to media stuff. It’s a route I would like to go down when I stop. But I’m the type of person who doesn’t think too much about anything, really – I just do it.”
‘Geraint Thomas Cycling Club’, a podcast by Crowd Network, is available now
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