His young teammate Egan Bernal swept to Suisse victory and although Thomas recovered to make the start line of the Tour de France, the pair were installed as co-leaders by Ineos team principal Dave Brailsford in an obvious downvote of confidence in Thomas’s form.
Britain boomed into a cycling powerhouse under performance director Brailsford, who then set Team Sky the quest of winning the Tour de France and achieved the feat with Wiggins in 2012, before Froome’s years of domination and Thomas’s triumph.
Thomas got himself back in shape but he crashed at the Tour de Suisse, two weeks before the Tour de France.
The question was whether Geraint Thomas could carry his body over cobbled track and hard hills, whether he could climb into the sky and fly back down a sheer mountain face, day after day, without getting hurt.
In the shape of his life Thomas conquered a brutal Tour, while Froome faltered two months after winning the Giro d’Italia.
