Daniel Lloyd (born 11 August 1980) is an English broadcaster,

content creator Content creation or content creative is the act of producing and sharing information or media content for specific audiences, particularly in digital contexts. According to '' Dictionary.com'', content refers to "something that is to be expresse ...

and retired professional

road racing cyclist Road bicycle racing is the cycle sport discipline of road cycling, held primarily on paved roads. Road racing is the most popular professional form of bicycle racing, in terms of numbers of competitors, events and spectators. The two most comm ...

from

Christchurch, Dorset Christchurch () is a town and civil parish on the south coast of Dorset, England. The parish had a population of 31,372 in 2021. It adjoins Bournemouth to the west, with the New Forest to the east. Part of the Historic counties of England, hist ...

. Lloyd's professional cycling victories include the

Vuelta a Extremadura The Tour of Extremadura (''Spanish: Vuelta Ciclista Internacional Extremadura '' or ''Vuelta a Extremadura'') was an annual multiple stage bicycle race in Spain, visiting the main towns of the Extremadura region. Beginning as an amateur An a ...

overall in 2008 and stages of Tour of Siam and

Tour of Qinghai Lake The Tour of Qinghai Lake is an annual professional road bicycle racing stage race held in the Qinghai province of China since 2002 and is named after Qinghai Lake. The race is sanctioned by the International Cycling Union (UCI) as a 2.HC race as ...

in 2006. Lloyd has said that his favourite races include the

Tour of Flanders The Tour of Flanders () may refer to the following cycle races: * Tour of Flanders (men's race) The Tour of Flanders (), also known as ''De Ronde'' (''"The Tour"''), is an annual road bicycle racing, road cycling race held in Belgium every spri ...

, one of the two major

Cobbled Classics The cobbled classics are four cycling classics held in March and April. Cobblestones, like mountainous terrain, are important elements in courses of cycling. Many classic cycle races in northwestern Europe contain cobbled sections. The two Monumen ...

, and

Strade Bianche The Strade Bianche (; ) is a road bicycle race in Tuscany, Central Italy, starting and finishing in Siena. First held in 2007, it is raced annually on the first or second Saturday of March. The name stems from the historic white gravel roads in ...

, in which he became the first British rider to claim a top-10 finish in 2009. He has also noted that the highlights of his cycling career were reaching the

Champs-Élysées The Avenue des Champs-Élysées (, ; ) is an Avenue (landscape), avenue in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, France, long and wide, running between the Place de la Concorde in the east and the Place Charles de Gaulle in the west, where the Arc ...

in the

2010 Tour de France The 2010 Tour de France was the 97th edition of the Tour de France cycle race, one of cycling's Grand Tours. It started on with an 8.9 km prologue time trial in Rotterdam, the first start in the Netherlands since 1996. The race visited th ...

and riding in the

2009 Tour of Qatar The 2009 Tour of Qatar was held from 1 February to 6 February 2009 in Qatar. It was a multiple stage road cycling race that took part over six stages with a total of and was part of the 2008–09 UCI Asia Tour. The Race was won by Tom Boonen ...

, which was his first race with the Cervélo TestTeam.

Career

Lloyd started cycling competitively as a mountain bike racer in his early teens and won the Southern Area Mountain Bike Championships as a junior. He started competing in road races at around the same time and would later focus on this discipline. Lloyd was active in the professional peloton from 2001 to 2012, with his most successful years coming between 2006 and 2009. After competing for Endurasport, Flanders-Afin.com and Giant Asia Racing Team in his early years as a professional, in 2007 Lloyd signed a contract with DFL–Cyclingnews–Litespeed for whom he rode for one year. He was a member of the Irish team in 2008. In 2009 he joined the (CTT), and was one of seven riders to move to when CTT folded at the end of 2010. After his contract expired at the end of 2011, he signed for the British . In November 2012, Lloyd announced his retirement from professional cycling. He became an assistant

directeur sportif A ''directeur sportif'' (, ) is a person directing a cycling team during a road bicycle racing event. It is seen as the equivalent to a field manager in baseball, or a head coach in football. At professional level, a directeur sportif follows t ...

at IG-Sigma Sport the following season.

Race wins

Lloyd was the general classification winner of the 2008

, his only overall victory in a professional stage race. The race was first held as an amateur event in 1987 and was uprated to professional status on the

UCI Europe Tour The UCI Continental Circuits are a series of road bicycle racing competitions which were introduced in 2005 by the Union Cycliste Internationale The Union Cycliste Internationale (; UCI; ) is the world governing body for sports cycling and ove ...

in 2005. His team started strongly with victory in the opening 22.4 km team time trial around Mérida, the only victory of Lloyd's career in that discipline. Lloyd finished in the top 20 on each of the remaining four stages and took the overall victory by 36 seconds. His other professional wins both came in 2006 while riding for Giant Asia Racing Team in

UCI Asia Tour The UCI Continental Circuits are a series of road bicycle racing competitions which were introduced in 2005 by the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) to expand cycling around the world. The five circuits (representing the continents of Africa, the ...

stage races. He started his season in January at the Tour of Siam, winning the final stage around

Phuket Phuket (; , , or ''Tongkah'') is one of the Southern Thailand, southern Provinces of Thailand, provinces (''changwat'') of Thailand. It consists of the island of Phuket, List of islands of Thailand, the country's largest island, and another 3 ...

by 36 seconds ahead of teammate Kuan Hua Lai. He returned to Asia and the

in China in July, winning stage 4 on his way to 4th place overall. Giant Asia finished the season as the UCI Asia Tour Teams Champion.

Grand Tour participation

Lloyd contested a Grand Tour on three occasions, completing the race each time. He rode in the

Giro d'Italia The Giro d'Italia (; ), also known simply as the Giro, is an annual stage race, multiple-stage bicycle racing, bicycle race primarily held in Italy, while also starting in, or passing through, other countries. The first race was organized in 19 ...

twice, finishing 109th in

2009 2009 was designated as the International Year of Astronomy by the United Nations to coincide with the 400th anniversary of Galileo Galilei's first known astronomical studies with a telescope and the publication of Astronomia Nova by Joha ...

and 103rd in

2010 The year saw a multitude of natural and environmental disasters such as the 2010 Haiti earthquake, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and the 2010 Chile earthquake. The 2009 swine flu pandemic, swine flu pandemic which began the previous year ...

. He was employed primarily as a

domestique In road bicycle racing, a domestique is a rider who works for the benefit of their cycling team, team and leader, rather than trying to win the race. In French, ''domestique'' translates as "servant".However, in French, the term used is ''équip ...

for

Carlos Sastre Carlos Sastre Candil (; born 22 April 1975) is a former Spanish professional road bicycle racer and winner of the 2008 Tour de France. He consistently achieved outstanding results in the Vuelta a España and in the Tour de France. Sastre establis ...

, helping the reigning Tour de France champion to a 4th place overall finish in 2009. Sastre was later upgraded to second behind winner

Denis Menchov Denis Nikolayevich Menshov (often mistakenly romanized as Menchov, ; born 25 January 1978) is a former professional Russian road bicycle racer, who rode as a professional between 2000 and 2013. He was best known as a general classification rider ...

after

Danilo di Luca Danilo Di Luca (born 2 January 1976) is a former Italian professional road racing cyclist, best known for winning the 2007 Giro d'Italia, but also for several positive doping tests, the last of which resulting in a lifetime ban from the sport. D ...

and

Franco Pellizotti Franco Pellizotti (born 15 January 1978) is an Italian former professional road bicycle racer, who rode professionally between 2001 and 2018 for the Alessio, , and teams. Pellizotti now works as a directeur sportif for the team. Career Early ...

were excluded for doping violations. In his sole

Tour de France The Tour de France () is an annual men's multiple-stage cycle sport, bicycle race held primarily in France. It is the oldest and most prestigious of the three Grand Tour (cycling), Grand Tours, which include the Giro d'Italia and the Vuelta a ...

appearance in

, Lloyd finished 164th of the 170 riders who completed the race, over four hours behind initial winner

Alberto Contador Alberto Contador Velasco (; born 6 December 1982) is a Spanish former professional cyclist. He is one of the most successful riders of his era, winning the Tour de France twice (2007, 2009), the Giro d'Italia twice (2008, 2015), and the Vuelta ...

. He would later be upgraded several places after multiple riders were excluded from the results, including Contador which saw

Andy Schleck Andy Raymond Schleck (; born 10 June 1985) is a Luxembourgish former professional road bicycle racer. He won the 2010 Tour de France, being awarded it retroactively in February 2012 after Alberto Contador's hearing at the Court of Arbitration fo ...

declared the official victor. He finished 22nd on stage 11 from

Sisteron Sisteron (; , ; from ) is a commune in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence department, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, southeastern France. Sisteron is situated on the banks of the river Durance just after the confluence of the rivers Buëch and Sasse. ...

Bourg-lès-Valence Bourg-lès-Valence (; ) is a commune in the Drôme department in southeastern France. It is a suburb of Valence. The archaeologist and Hellenist Fernand Courby (1878–1932) was born in Bourg-lès-Valence. In 2014–2019, Bourg-lès-Valence ...

, his highest placing in an individual Grand Tour stage.

British National Championships

Lloyd competed in seven editions of the road race at the British National Championships, with second-place finishes in 2007 and 2009. In 2007, he rode the last 70 km in a two-rider breakaway with

David Millar David Millar (born 4 January 1977) is a Scottish retired professional road racing cyclist. He rode for Cofidis from 1997 to 2004 and Garmin–Sharp from 2008 to 2014. He has won four stages of the Tour de France, five of the Vuelta a España a ...

. Millar, riding in the national championships for the first time since his doping suspension, would ultimately prevail in the sprint to the line. He finished 4th in the 2008 race, stating that he was in "balls of tears" and that this race was his "biggest disappointment" given his confidence that he could win the title after getting in the breakaway. In the 2009 edition, Lloyd chased down future Tour de France winners

Bradley Wiggins Sir Bradley Marc Wiggins (born 28 April 1980) is a British former professional Road bicycle racing, road and track cycling, track racing cyclist, who competed professionally between 2001 and 2016. He began his cycling career on the track, but ...

and

Chris Froome Christopher Clive Froome, (; born 20 May 1985) is a British professional road racing cyclist who currently rides for UCI ProTeam . He has won seven Grand Tours: four editions of the Tour de France (in 2013, 2015, 2016 and 2017), one Giro d' ...

in the latter part of the race, ultimately dropping Wiggins and finishing ahead of Froome and

Peter Kennaugh Peter Robert Kennaugh Order of the British Empire, MBE (born 15 June 1989) is a Isle of Man, Manx former professional racing cyclist, who rode professionally between 2010 and 2019 for and . In 2012 he won the gold medal as part of the Great Brit ...

but losing out to Kristian House in the final sprint. He made his only start in the

British National Time Trial Championships The British National Time Trial Championships for cycling are held annually. The winners of each event are awarded with a symbolic white cycling jersey featuring blue and red stripes, which can be worn by the rider at other time trial events in ...

in 2005, finishing eleven seconds off the podium in 4th place.

Other races

After winning a stage and finishing 4th overall in the 2006 race for Giant Asia, Lloyd returned to the

in 2007 representing DFL–Cyclingnews–Litespeed. He featured in the top 20 on each of the nine stages, finishing second overall behind Giro d'Italia stage winner

Gabriele Missaglia Gabriele Missaglia (born 24 July 1970 in Inzago) is an Italian former professional road bicycle racer. He currently works as a directeur sportif for UCI ProTeam . Major results ;1994 : 2nd GP Industria Artigianato e Commercio Carnaghese ;1995 : ...

. This result was instrumental in Lloyd ending the year as the highest ranked rider in the DFL squad, finishing a career-high 329th in the PCS rankings for 2007. Leading up to the

2008 Olympic Games The 2008 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXIX Olympiad () and officially branded as Beijing 2008 (), were an international multisport event held from 8 to 24 August 2008, in Beijing, China. A total of 10,942 athletes fr ...

, Lloyd expressed a desire to be selected for the British Olympic road race team, and put together a series of strong results which led to him being considered for selection. However, he was not included in the final squad. In 2009, Lloyd made his sole appearance in the road race at the

UCI World Championships The UCI World Championships are annual competitions promoted by the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) to determine world champion cyclists. They are held in several different styles of racing, in a different country each year. Championship winn ...

which were held that year in

Mendrisio Mendrisio (; ) is a Municipalities of Switzerland, municipality in the district of Mendrisio (district), Mendrisio in the Cantons of Switzerland, canton of Ticino in Switzerland. Mendrisio is the seat of the Accademia di Architettura di Mendris ...

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

. Part of a nine-strong team, he was one of seven British riders not to finish the race. He also rode in four

monument A monument is a type of structure that was explicitly created to commemorate a person or event, or which has become relevant to a social group as a part of their remembrance of historic times or cultural heritage, due to its artistic, historical ...

races, with a best finish of 45th at the

, and finished 9th at the 2009 edition of

. He participated in the

Tour of Britain The Tour of Britain is a multi-stage cycling race, conducted on British roads, in which participants race across Great Britain to complete the race in the fastest time. The event dates back to the first British stage races held just after th ...

five times, with a best overall finish of 10th in

2011 The year marked the start of a Arab Spring, series of protests and revolutions throughout the Arab world advocating for democracy, reform, and economic recovery, later leading to the depositions of world leaders in Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen ...

. This was the last notable result of his career, and the

2012 2012 was designated as: *International Year of Cooperatives *International Year of Sustainable Energy for All Events January *January 4 – The Cicada 3301 internet hunt begins. * January 12 – Peaceful protests begin in the R ...

edition of the race was his final outing as a professional cyclist.

Management career

After finishing his road career with Team IG–Sigma Sport, in 2013 Lloyd was announced as an assistant

for the team. He made his managerial debut at the

2013 Tour of Britain The 2013 Tour of Britain was the tenth running of the current Tour of Britain and the 74th British tour in total. The race consisted of eight stages, starting on 15 September in Peebles, and finishing on 22 September in London. The race was part ...

Broadcasting career

Since 2012, Lloyd has worked as a broadcaster and content creator for Global Cycling Network (GCN). Lloyd is the lead presenter for GCN's news and race preview shows, often alongside former IG-Sigma teammate Simon Richardson. He has used this platform to voice his opinion on cycling matters, for example regarding whether only amateur and unsigned riders should be eligible to compete in the men's under-23 road race at the

. As of 2022 the event is also open to professionals who meet the age criteria, with Lloyd opining that contracted riders should only be eligible for the elite road race event. After GCN owner Play Sports Networks (PSN) was acquired by

Eurosport Eurosport is a group of pay television networks in Europe and parts of Asia, owned and operated by Warner Bros. Discovery through its WBD Sports unit, it operates two main channels—Eurosport 1 and Eurosport 2—across most of its territorie ...

parent company

Warner Bros. Discovery Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc. (WBD) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational mass media and Outline of entertainment, entertainment Conglomerate (company), conglomerate headquartered in New York City. It was formed from WarnerMedi ...

in 2019, he also provided commentary and in-studio punditry during Eurosport and GCN+ coverage of Grand Tour and other major races. After Warner sold their majority stake in PSN back to the company's founders in 2024, Lloyd announced that he would no longer appear on Eurosport programming and would be focusing solely on his role at GCN. With the closure of the GCN+ streaming service and GCN website, Lloyd's involvement will predominantly focus on content for the GCN

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

channel. He has also served as the international English finish line commentator for the

Major results

;2006 : 1st Stage 7 Tour of Siam : 4th Overall

::1st Stage 4 : 4th Overall Tour d'Indonesia ;2007 : 2nd Overall

: 2nd Road race, National Road Championships ;2008 : 1st Jersey yellow

Overall

::1st Stage 1 ( TTT) : 4th Overall Volta Ciclista da Ascension : 4th Road race, National Road Championships : 6th Overall Cinturón Ciclista a Mallorca : 9th

Grand Prix Pino Cerami Grand Prix Pino Cerami is a single-day road bicycle race held annually in April in Hainaut, Belgium. From 2005 to 2019, the race was organized as a 1.1 event on the UCI Europe Tour, before being cancelled from 2019 to 2022. Upon its return in 2 ...

;2009 : 2nd Road race, National Road Championships : 4th Overall

Tour of Qatar The Tour of Qatar was an annual professional cycling stage race held in Qatar. First organized in 2002, the event was part of the UCI Asia Tour until 2016. The 2017 edition was to have seen the event upgraded to the UCI World Tour for the firs ...

: 9th Monte Paschi Strade Bianche ;2011 : 10th Overall

Grand Tour general classification results timeline

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lloyd, Daniel 1980 births Living people English male cyclists British male cyclists Sportspeople from Christchurch, Dorset Cycling announcers 21st-century English sportsmen