The pink jersey, the Trofeo Senza Fine, and a meeting with Pope Leo XIV would be enough for most people, but Simon Yates is deserving of more – a BBC Sports Personality of the Year nomination no less, according to his former cycling club’s treasurer.
In a dramatic turn of events, the 32-year-old achieved Giro d’Italia redemption on the slopes of the Colle delle Finestre on Saturday, turning this year’s race back in his favour on the penultimate stage in the Italian Alps.
After Sunday’s trophy lift and podium events, Monday saw Yates attend a Giro d’Italia media call in Rome, but the celebrations will not last long – the Visma-Lease a Bike rider is set to ride the Tour de France in support of Jonas Vingegaard.
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Bury Clarion Cycling Club’s Nick Hall has known the Yates family since Simon and Adam joined the club as teenagers, and told Cycling Weekly on Monday that Simon’s latest achievement surpassed anything else.
“It’s absolutely incredible, talk about redemption,” he said. “It was just amazing, the more you think about it the bigger the achievement seems to be. It’s his crowning moment, without a doubt. You’ve got Bradley Wiggins, possibly the most famous British cyclist there’s ever been, he put everything into trying to win the Giro and didn’t get anywhere near winning it. So for Simon to go and do that, a little lad from Bury, is just amazing, it really is.”
He added: “What he has achieved will probably go a little bit under the radar, because of who they are and how they are with the media sometimes. But he really should be up there as a contender for BBC Sports Personality of the Year after this, I do believe that.”
“In the general scheme of things, the Giro is the second biggest race in the world,” he said. “If you compare it to golf, which has got four majors, cycling has got three majors – so for Simon to have won two of them is just remarkable. It’s almost on a par with Rory McIlroy’s achievements in golf.”
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Yates on the gravel section of the Colle delles Finestre on Saturday
(Image credit: Getty Images)
Hall’s phone sprung into life – including with messages from Yates’s parents – once Simon crossed the line in Sestriere, all but confirming his second Grand Tour win.
“Sue was understandably very emotional, I think John tried to keep it bottled in a bit,” Hall said. “Even on Saturday after that stage he was saying: ‘It’s not over yet, I’m not celebrating until after tomorrow’ you never know what can happen, I guess. But they’re both absolutely over the moon as you can imagine.”
“I think they had it on in their house on several different channels, the laptop, everything,” he continued. “I think sometimes John has to go and sit in the garden and wait until it’s all finished because he feels too nervous to watch it all unfold.”
The latest achievement from one of Bury’s own will be the talk of the town, in cycling terms anyway, for now, Hall said.
“We’ve actually got a Bury Clarion club meeting on Monday evening,” he explained. “Obviously that’ll now be the main topic of conversation, so it could be a long meeting. I think most people will be driving but we’ll still have time for a quick beer to celebrate I’m sure.”
“We have a junior section called Bury Clarion Bullets,” he added. “It will be great for them to have someone like that who they can look up to. We have a few promising young racers and this will inspire them to think that if they’ve got the talent and they put in the effort and hard work then they can possibly go a long long way in the sport.”
His coach at Visma-Lease a Bike, Mathieu Heijboer, explained that the party can’t last for too long – the Tour is just a month away.
“He needs some time off now mentally to recharge the battery so he can then come back to us ready to fight again across three weeks at the Tour de France,” he said. “On a physical level he can’t sit still for too long because we’ll need to work again on some basic endurance, dropping the shape a bit and bringing it back on towards July.
“We’ll go to altitude in about two weeks again as a team and bring Simon there too. That’s because we feel as a group that it’s very important to bring the Tour de France team together to speak about the stages, the strategy and things like that, but also importantly to help create a bond between all of the riders in the build up.”