Geraint Thomas wants to emulate his track cycling success on the road

Geraint Thomas wants to emulate fellow Team Sky rider Bradley Wiggins by becoming a Tour de France contender.

The 23-year-old Welshman admits he will have to bide his time as he switches emphasis away from a track career that won him an Olympic team pursuit gold.

He will at first target sprint sections of road races to make his mark.

"I rode the track and that's what I concentrated on for the last three years... now my focus is totally switched on to the road," Thomas said.

"It's kind of like starting from scratch again really, it's a whole new team and a whole new philosophy."

The new Team Sky road racing team has the objective of supplying the first British winner of the Tour by 2015.

The early efforts will be built around Wiggins, who finished fourth in this year's Tour riding for Garmin-Slipstream.

Although Thomas has also ridden in the Tour, for Team Barloworld, he freely admits his focus has previously always been on track cycling.

Both men expect to defend their Olympic track titles at the London 2012 Games, Wiggins having taken the 4,000m individual pursuit title plus the team pursuit alongside Thomas in Beijing.

But the emphasis is now firmly on road glory with Team Sky.

"In Barloworld we never had a Tour contender but now we genuinely have in Brad, who was fourth last year and he's proven he can do it," Thomas told BBC Radio Wales' The Back Page programme.

"I just want to do everything I can to be in that Tour team and help him out as best I can.

"I'm still only 23 and Brad's 29 now, and that's the sort of age when you're at your peak on the road.

"So I've got plenty of years in front of me to keep improving and who knows in the future?

Can you imagine bringing the yellow jersey back to Wales, that would be special Geraint Thomas

"It's great to be where I am at the minute and I just want to keep improving and hopefully convert that on to the road.

"I've always liked the short time trials, like the prologues at the start of the Tour de France and things like that.

"That's something I really want to look at now and just start off there.

"It would be nice to go down the route Brad's gone and be a Tour contender in the future.

"Can you imagine bringing the yellow [winner's] jersey back to Wales, that would be special wouldn't it?"

*Listen to The Back Page every Saturday morning on BBC Radio Wales and online (0830 GMT); also available on demand for a week after transmission.

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