Richie Porte

Early years, Team UniSA–Australia & Praties

Porte started dedicated cycling in 2006 when he was 21 years of age. He comes from a triathlon background, having competed in the sport since 2003. Prior to that he was a competitive swimmer. Porte rode for UniSA–Australia at the 2008 Tour Down Under and finished ninth overall. He raced with a Tasmanian UCI Continental team, Praties, in 2008 and 2009, taking fifth place in the 2008 Herald Sun Tour and winning the Tours of Perth and Tasmania. Porte rose and under the eye of Andrea Tafi on the Monsummanese Grassi Mapei amateur Italian team in 2009, finishing tenth at the 2009 Tour de Langkawi. His performance at the 2009 Baby Giro, where he won the individual time trial, brought him to the attention of the professional teams.

2010: Team Saxo Bank & individual success

At the end of the 2009 season, he signed a two-year contract with Team Saxo Bank. His coach at Team Saxo Bank was compatriot Bradley McGee. In April, Porte went on to win the stage 4 time trial at the Tour de Romandie, finishing in tenth place overall. In May he made his Grand Tour debut in the Giro d'Italia where he finished seventh overall and won the young rider classification, by a margin of 7' 29" over Robert Kišerlovski, cementing his place as a rider for the future. He also led the race during stages 11 to 13 and thus wore the pink jersey. In July Porte placed tenth in the Clásica de San Sebastián and had a further run of strong performances; second in the stage 5 time trial of the Post Danmark Rundt, fourth overall at the Eneco Tour and fourth overall at the Tour of Britain. Porte narrowly missed out on the bronze medal in the time trial at the UCI Road World Championships, held in the Australian city of Geelong; he finished in fourth place, six and a half seconds down on third-place finisher, Germany's Tony Martin.

2011: Time trial successes

Although the 2011 season brought less individual success for Porte, through the expectation that he would become a key domestique for Alberto Contador in his overall victory in the Giro d'Italia, Porte continued his strong time trial performances; placing third in Paris–Nice and eighth at the Tour of the Basque Country. Porte then won the fourth stage at Vuelta a Castilla y León by virtue of Contador's disqualification. Porte then placed third in the final stage time trial at the Giro d'Italia, and fourth in the final stage time trial at the Tour de France. Porte then went on to win fifth stage time trial at the Post Danmark Rundt, in Helsingør, by a margin of 10 seconds over teammate, Gustav Larsson. Porte then finished his season with sixth position in the time trial at the UCI Road World Championships.

2012: Move to Team Sky

Porte joined Team Sky ahead of the 2012 season. In January 2012, he competed in his national championships in Buninyong and Learmonth, where he finished third in the road race, and placed fifth in the time trial several days later. In February 2012, Porte took the lead of the Volta ao Algarve after winning the race's queen stage, the summit finish at the Alto do Malhão in Loulé. He held the lead until the end of the race, eventually finishing 37 seconds clear of defending race winner, Tony Martin. Porte then worked for Bradley Wiggins in Paris–Nice, helping his leader win the race overall. Porte was a key member of the Sky teams that helped Wiggins go on to win the Tour de Romandie, the Critérium du Dauphiné and the Tour de France. Porte then rode the Vuelta a España in support of Chris Froome, and took second place on stage 20.

2013: Paris–Nice and super-domestique

In the absence of Wiggins and Froome, Porte was selected to lead Team Sky at Paris–Nice. He won the fifth stage of the race – the queen stage – with an attack on La Montagne de Lure to take the lead of the race, from Garmin–Sharp's Andrew Talansky. Porte also won the final time trial on the Col d'Èze by 23 seconds over Talansky to seal overall victory by 55 seconds. Porte's time was only four seconds short of the course record, set by Wiggins the previous year.

Porte's good form continued into the Critérium International, winning the second stage's time trial. A second-place finish on the final mountain stage was not enough to prevent stage winner and teammate Chris Froome from winning the general classification, but did secure Porte the points classification, and second place overall.

Porte was again given the lead of Team Sky for the Tour of the Basque Country. Porte powered away in the final kilometres of stage five from a small group of elite riders, including race leader and teammate Sergio Henao, to claim the stage. In the sixth and final stage, an individual time trial, Porte could not match Nairo Quintana over the undulating parcours, but managed to rise to second place in the general classification, ahead of Henao. Porte returned to a supporting role for Chris Froome at the Tour de Romandie. He helped Froome win the race and placed eighth overall himself in the process. Porte and Froome next featured at the Critérium du Dauphiné at the beginning of June. Porte sat fifth overall after the time trial on stage four, and on the following stage helped Froome take the race lead by setting a strong tempo to drop Rohan Dennis, before Froome attacked to win the stage. Porte in the process moved up to second overall, 52 seconds behind his leader. Froome allowed Porte to attack on stage seven, although he only managed to take one second out of the other contenders. On the concluding stage eight, Froome and Porte rode clear of their rivals on the final climb, with only Andrew Talansky able to follow, to secure a one-two finish in the overall standings.

Porte entered the Tour de France as super-domestique for Froome. On stage eight – the first mountain stage – Peter Kennaugh and then Porte dropped most of the overall contenders and brought back an earlier attack by Nairo Quintana on the final climb before Froome attacked to take the stage win and overall lead. Porte was able to finish second on the stage, 51 seconds behind Froome, to rise to second overall. However, in the following stage Porte cracked following numerous early attacks by Movistar Team, Garmin–Sharp and Saxo–Tinkoff riders, leaving Froome completely isolated for most of the stage. Porte lost over ten minutes and dropped out of overall contention, although Froome managed to avoid time loss by fending off several attacks from Alejandro Valverde and Quintana. On stage 15, Porte again provided the launch pad for Froome's victory on Mont Ventoux. On stage 18 – which finished at Alpe d'Huez – Porte's assistance proved vital for Froome, as Froome ran into difficulty towards the end of the stage; Porte dropped back to the team car to illegally get energy gels for his leader, then paced him to the end of the climb to limit his losses to Quintana and Joaquim Rodríguez. Porte and Froome each received a 20-second time penalty and a fine of 200 Swiss francs for the infringement. Froome went on to comfortably win the Tour by four minutes, 20 seconds over Quintana with Porte finishing 19th overall.

2014: A season wrecked by illness

After finishing third behind Simon Gerrans and Cadel Evans in the national road race championships, Porte began his 2014 season at his home race, the Tour Down Under. He won the penultimate fifth stage, finishing on Old Willunga Hill, and finished fourth in the general classification on the final stage. Porte then followed up his result in the Tour Down Under with second overall at the Vuelta a Andalucía. Porte's season then took a downwards turn finishing 22nd overall at the Critérium du Dauphiné. Porte then failed to start at Tirreno–Adriatico and failed to finish at; Tour de Romandie, Liège–Bastogne–Liège, Volta a Catalunya, culminating in him taking leadership of Team Sky due to Chris Froome's abandonment and then finishing 23rd at the Tour de France. Porte then failed to finish the Vattenfall Cyclassics as well as GP Ouest-France which led him to end his season early after being diagnosed with pneumonia.

Just before the Tour de France, Porte revealed that he had beaten teammate Chris Froome's time on the famous Col de la Madone climb near to Monte Carlo. Porte completed the climb in 29 minutes 40 seconds, besting Froome's time by 29 seconds.

2015: Final season at Sky – Early season success

Porte started the 2015 season with success, taking victory in the Australian National Time Trial Championships. Much like the previous season, Porte took victory on the queen stage of the Tour Down Under at Old Willunga Hill resulting in a second place on the overall general classification. Porte then returned to Europe at the Volta ao Algarve again taking victory on the queen stage to the summit finish of Malhão, this stage win succeeded in elevating Porte to fourth overall on general classification behind teammate Geraint Thomas, as well as taking the win in the mountains classification. Porte's next victory came at Paris–Nice where he and teammate Thomas took a one-two victory on the summit finish of Croix de Chaubouret. Despite losing the chance to take the overall lead after a crash on the penultimate stage of the race, a victory in the final-day time trial (again on the Col d'Èze), by a margin of 13 seconds to his closest rival, gave him his second overall victory in the race in the past three seasons. Furthermore, this pushed him to the top of the UCI Road World Rankings.

Porte's next victory came in late March when he secured the overall win at the Volta a Catalunya. Despite not winning a stage, Porte won the race by a margin of four seconds from Alejandro Valverde, after achieving two top-5 stage placings on the decisive finishes of La Molina and Valls. In late April Porte notched up his third overall win of the season, taking the Giro d'Italia warm-up Giro del Trentino four-day stage race. Porte took a decisive stage victory on the Queen stage summit finish to Brentonico giving him a margin of 24 seconds to his closest rival, Mikel Landa. Porte would carry the majority of this gap to the finish in Cles. In doing so he became the first ever rider to win the Paris–Nice, Volta a Catalunya and Giro del Trentino treble in one season.

In the Giro d'Italia, Porte made headlines by having a motor-home to sleep in as he was the team leader while his teammates slept in hotels. He was competitive during the first week of the race, and sat third overall after stage nine. However, on Stage 10 Porte punctured 5 km from the finish, and accepted a change of wheels from Simon Clarke from the Orica–GreenEDGE team. Porte initially lost 47 seconds to the peloton, but was then docked two minutes and fined 200 Swiss francs for accepting Clarke's wheel as this manoeuvre is illegal according to UCI rules, dropping him to 12th place overall. On stage 13, Porte was involved in a crash 3.3 kilometres (2.1 miles) from the stage finish, and lost a further two minutes. Porte suffered a bad individual time trial on stage 14 and an even worse stage 15, where he lost 27 minutes to then-leader Alberto Contador. After that debacle, he gave the leadership of the team to Leopold König. After the aforementioned stage, he announced he was abandoning the race due to a leg injury.

After the Giro, Porte was included in Sky's squad for the Tour de France as a key domestique for Chris Froome. He played a key role in Froome's overall victory in that race, especially during the first mountain stage 10, where Porte not only made the final pull that allowed Froome to launch his decisive attack, but recovered to overtake the chasing Nairo Quintana and arrive second behind Froome, increasing the latter's lead over Quintana due to bonus seconds. During the final mountain stage 20, with Froome seemingly running out of steam on the long uphill finish and Nairo Quintana aggressively attacking in front, Porte was the last Sky rider to steadily pull and pace Froome up the climb, allowing him to limit his losses and secure the overall lead and yellow jersey, to gain his second Tour de France victory. During the Tour Porte confirmed that he would be leaving the team at the end of the year, with the aim of becoming a team leader elsewhere. This would later, in August, be confirmed to be BMC Racing Team.

2016: First year at BMC

Ahead of the 2016 season Porte highlighted the Tour de France and the Olympic road race and time trial as his targets for the year. He started his season strongly in Australia, finishing second to new teammate Rohan Dennis in the Australian National Time Trial Championships before going to the Tour Down Under, where he took his first victory in BMC colours by winning stage 5 to Willunga Hill for the third year in a row and finished second overall. He subsequently struggled in the Tour of Oman in February, losing over three minutes to the leaders on each of the first two stages, before bouncing back upon returning to Europe, taking third place in the general classification at Paris–Nice after attacking the last stage's final climb alongside Alberto Contador followed by an overall fourth place in the Volta a Catalunya. Following his third place at Paris-Nice, Porte spent one week as world number 1, during the period in which the new rankings system was forming. Porte targeted the Tour de France, but lost time early on with a mechanical problem on stage 2. He rallied to perform well in the mountains and individual time trials, finishing fifth overall, his highest Grand Tour placing to date.