Sir David Brailsford was knighted for services to cycling and the London 2012 Olympics during a ceremony at Buckingham Palace today. Double Olympic gold medallist Jason Kenny received an OBE and Joanna Rowsell, part of the gold medal winning women’s pursuit team, an MBE.
After the ceremony, Brailsford told Sky News: "It's a unique moment in my life. It's nice to be here and it is a great honour. I've been involved in cycling for most of my life, and in the last few years British Cycling and Team Sky have really progressed and helped make the sport more mainstream here in the UK.
"I'm here on behalf of the sport – what the riders, the backroom staff and our partners have helped achieve. The sport is not about looking backwards, it's about looking forward." He added that he is now looking to the future and further success at the Rio Olympics in 2016.
Brailsford is widely seen as the mastermind behind Great Britain’s rise to dominance on both the track and road, through his roles as performance director at British Cycling and principal at Team Sky.
In 2008 he oversaw a record breaking medal haul at the Beijing Olympics, where GB athletes took eight golds among 14 medals. In 2010 he launched Team Sky, vowing to win the Tour de France with a British rider in five years, a feat completed last year when Bradley Wiggins took top honours and compatriot, Chris Froome, finished second. And in 2012 he guided the country’s cyclists to a further 14 medals – eight of them gold – at the London Olympics.