In 1999, riding for Birkenhead North End CC as a junior, aged 17, he won the Eddie Soens Memorial Road Race, a handicap race open to all categories. It remains the only time that a junior rider has won the race.[7] He went on to take the junior British National Road Race Championships that year.[7]
Representing his country Cummings won the team pursuit at the 2005 UCI Track Cycling World Championships in Los Angeles and at the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne with the British and English cycling teams respectively. He also took bronze in the individual pursuit at the 2006 Commonwealth Games. At the 2004 Olympics in Athens Cummings and the Great Britain team won the silver medal in the team pursuit and achieved a time of 3:59.866 in the heats.
The following year saw Cummings take a single victory in the third Giro del Capo challenge,[17] with other top-five finishes at the Giro della Provincia di Reggio Calabria (fifth),[18] and the Coppa Bernocchi (fourth).[19] Despite this, Barloworld folded at the end of the season.[11][20]
In September 2011, Cummings signed a contract with the BMC Racing Team for the 2012 season.[2] The following February, Cummings broke his pelvis in an accident while competing in the Volta ao Algarve.[30] In April, bad luck struck again when he fractured his left wrist in the Tour of the Basque Country.[31] He recuperated from those injuries and competed in the Tour de France, where he was a domestique to his leader Cadel Evans and finished 95th overall.[32] In the Vuelta a España, he gained his first Grand Tour stage victory. On Stage 13, he broke away with six other riders after the first hour of racing. The break made it through on the mainly flat course and he attacked with about 4 kilometres (2.5 miles) to race, creating a gap. He held on to his lead and won by four seconds over the two chasers, Cameron Meyer of Orica–GreenEDGE and Team Sky's Juan Antonio Flecha.[33] He completed his season with a stage victory on the final day of the Tour of Beijing,[34] getting the better of Ryder Hesjedal in a sprint à deux in Pinggu.
Cummings (left) at the 2015 Tour de France, where he won stage 14 of the race
In October 2014, Cummings announced that he would be joining MTN–Qhubeka for the 2015 season.[39] In his first race with the team, Cummings won the Trofeo Andratx-Mirador d'Es Colomer one-day race, held as part of the season-opening Vuelta a Mallorca; he attacked on the final climb of the race, and was able to fend off Alejandro Valverde in the closing metres for the win.[40] He recorded top-ten overall finishes at the Tirreno–Adriatico and Circuit de la Sarthe stage races in the spring, finishing sixth in both events.[41][42] In July, Cummings won stage 14 of the Tour de France, beating French riders Thibaut Pinot and Romain Bardet to the line at the Mende Aerodrome, after the trio had gone clear at the top of the Côte de la Croix Neuve – a second-category climb with 1.5 kilometres (0.93 miles) remaining.[43] It was the first Tour de France stage win for both Cummings and his South African team MTN–Qhubeka, with the result coming on Mandela Day.[44]
2016
In his first start of the 2016 season, Cummings won the fourth stage of March's Tirreno–Adriatico; having been part of the breakaway, Cummings attacked with approximately 3 kilometres (1.9 miles) remaining of the 222-kilometre (138-mile) stage to Foligno, and soloed to a 13-second winning margin over his closest competitors.[45] The following month, he won the third stage of the Tour of the Basque Country, outfoxing the peloton with a move with 1 kilometre (0.62 miles) to go, and held on to win by several metres in Lesaka.[46] In his final warm-up race prior to the Tour de France, Cummings won the final stage of the Critérium du Dauphiné, having attacked with 50 kilometres (31 miles) remaining on the fourth of the day's six categorised climbs, and ended up winning the stage by almost four minutes.[47]
Cummings at the 2016 Tour de France, where he won a stage of the race for the second year in succession
After six stages of July's Tour de France, Cummings had lost almost 45 minutes to the race leader Greg Van Avermaet, and was in 191st place out of the 198 competitors.[48] On the seventh stage, Cummings took another breakaway win, having dropped his breakaway companions just before the intermediate sprint at Sarrancolin; he would go on to win the stage at Lac de Payolle by 64 seconds, over Daryl Impey and Daniel Navarro.[49][50] In the same month, he was named to Great Britain's cycling team for the Olympic Games in Rio – replacing Peter Kennaugh for the road race.[7][51] Cummings had previously been left out of the team when it was announced at the beginning of the month, and had lobbied to the British media for coach Rod Ellingworth to quit – due to his involvement with Team Sky, with four riders from the team forming part of the five-man British squad.[52]
Having previously finished second in 2008 and 2011, Cummings won the Tour of Britain for the first time, in 2016
He then rode his home race, the Tour of Britain, as part of Team Dimension Data alongside Mark Cavendish.[53] On the second stage in Cumbria, Cummings was part of a group that broke clear on the Kirkstone Pass to chase down the breakaway; a small lead group was formed on the run-in to Kendal, and only Julien Vermote was able to follow the attacks put in by Cummings.[54] Cummings led up the final climb in Kendal, but Vermote pulled clear as the gradient eased and took the stage win and the leader's jersey,[55] while Cummings gained approximately a minute on his main general classification rivals.[56] Cummings took over the race lead following the sixth stage,[57] a summit finish at Haytor, as Vermote lost around 90 seconds to him. Despite Rohan Dennis taking time off him in both of the stages held in Bristol on the penultimate day,[58] Cummings maintained his race lead and ultimately won the race for the first time – the first home win since Bradley Wiggins in 2013 – by 26 seconds from Dennis.[59] Writing for The Guardian, journalist William Fotheringham considered this win for Cummings as the most important stage race victory of his career up to that date.[60]
Cummings endured a difficult 2018 season, recording no top-10 finishes, and suffering health issues with an injury to the head of his left fibula at the Tour of Austria,[64] and breathing problems at the Critérium du Dauphiné.[64] In 2019, Cummings finished in third place at the British National Time Trial Championships in Norfolk,[65] and also finished in tenth place overall at the Arctic Race of Norway,[66] but injury and illnesses continued to effect Cummings.[67] Later in the year at the Tour of Britain – and having featured in the final selection on the fourth stage[68] – on home roads in the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral, Cummings was involved in a crash some 50 kilometres (31 miles) from the finish of the fifth stage.[69] He was later diagnosed with four fractured vertebrae in his back, ending his season.[7][70]
Retirement, directeur sportif
In November 2019, Cummings announced his retirement from professional cycling.[71]
In February 2021 Cummings announced that he was returning to Team Sky, since renamed as Ineos Grenadiers, joining the team's management as a development directeur sportif and coach.[6] In December 2023, he was appointed as the team's director of racing from the 2024 season onwards.[72]
^"Cav sprints to London win". Sky Sports. Sky UK. 18 September 2011. Retrieved 17 December 2023. Steve Cummings took a comfortable second place for Team Sky after his exploits in the earlier time trial had seen him rise three places on the leaderboard [...]
.jpg)
.jpg)
