Rod Ellingworth will take a senior role for 2013 and oversee the management of the Sports Directors and Race Coaches in his capacity as Performance Manager.

The new position is just reward for a man who played a key role in nurturing a golden generation of British cyclists before joining Team Sky as a Race Coach during their first season in the peloton.

As well as his stellar work with Team Sky over the last three seasons, Ellingworth also masterminded Team GB’s World Championships success in 2011 and is now tasked with putting an improved structure in place at every level of the team.

On his new role, he explains: “It’s a post that involves overseeing the race programmes, training camps and external commitments to ensure we produce the best possible performances on the road.

“As a performance team, we all have a say in how that comes about, but somebody has to be responsible for recording what we’re doing and monitoring how we’re doing it.

“At the same time, I’ll still retain the group of riders I coach on a day-to-day basis and I’ll be on the road throughout the season working closely with the rest of the performance team to ensure we give our riders the very best chance of success.”