Golden future for bronze medallist Chris Froome - Telegraph.co.uk

"I'm 27 and I hope I'll be luckier later in my career," Froome said after he gave up a stage win to help Wiggins.

His efforts did not go unnoticed by veteran observers in France, with one arguing that he was "bossing" the race, and Wiggins yesterday describing his team-mate's overall efforts as "phenomenal".

Last night, the gold medallist admitted that he was unlikely to top his achievements of winning the Tour and the Olympics on home soil – and indicated he wanted to get drunk to celebrate.

Froome said Wiggins deserved to let his hair down after keeping the champagne on ice after his triumph in France, in preparation for the Games, predicting that there would now be "a big party on the horizon for him".

But the younger man declared that he would only be taking one day off "to soak up the Olympic spirit" before getting back in the saddle on Friday ahead of this month's Vuelta a Espana.

Froome revealed that his medal win came despite having "emptied the tank completely" in Saturday's ultimately unsuccessful Olympics road race – in which once again he was a team player trying to help another rider to glory – and hardly trained on Sunday and Monday.

He hailed the achievements in the Tour as "quite something" but clearly still had the longer term on his mind, saying: "For us I hope it's just the start of a bit more to come."

Froome also indicated the scale of his ambition saying: "In the future, I would love to win the Tour and I want to lead a team to try and win it one day."

Born in Kenya, he later moved to South Africa before gaining British citizenship.

He started his sporting career in mountain biking before shifting to road cycling, specialising as a climber and in 2010 joining the British team, Team Sky.

During the Tour, Wiggins himself predicted great things for his team-mate.

"Chris will have his day for sure and I will be there to support him," he said.

"He is an incredible climber. Every inch of the way on this Tour, Chris has been absolutely solid and him not being in an opposition team has been one less thing to worry about. If he was in an opposing team, then you would constantly have that battle all the time.

"You'd rather have Chris in your camp than someone else's."