There is huge pressure on Bradley Wiggins to become the first Briton to crack the Tour de France podium, Malcolm Elliott, the evergreen pro who blazed the trail for British cycling more than 20 years ago, said on Tuesday.

Wiggins finished fourth in 2009, equalling Robert Millar’s best British finish, and after moving to head up the new British Team Sky the talk has been of him doing better this year.

But Elliott, who raced the tour in 1987 and 1988 and won stages and the points jersey in the Vuelta, knows that nothing can be taken for granted in the biggest race of all.

“It’s a big ask, a very big ask,” he told Reuters in an interview.

“Having seen what he did last year I’d like to think he can do it — to show that wasn’t a flash in the pan — but there is a lot of pressure on him. I feel for him, there is a real weight of expectation on that team now. It’s tough and it only takes one bad day and it can be all over.

“He had a bad day in the Giro on Sunday and I suppose he’s just going through the motions there now.”

Wiggins, who has won three Olympic gold medals on the track, surprised everyone when, having shed 10 kilos, he pushed third-placed Lance Armstrong all the way last year.

“It’s not long since he was a pure track rider so he’s done fantastically well and I’d love to see him do well in the Tour again,” said Elliott.

“It’s hard to quantify really. He’s still new to the game in a way so there could still be lots more to come through.”

Everyone probably seems new to Elliott, who turns 49 in a few weeks having begun his professional career in 1984 two years after winning double gold at the Commonwealth Games.

He won multiple domestic titles and retired in 1997 but came back six years later and continues to race as a pro.

He was racing for the Motorpoint team in London on Tuesday in the first leg of the Halfords Tour series of 10 city-centre events with teams racing one-kilometre laps for an hour.

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Elliott and his fellow competitors were happy to sign autographs and pose for photos among the fans as the Canary Wharf business district swaps suits for lycra.

“I’ve spent many years doing this type of event and I really enjoy them,” he said. “I said last year was going to be my final year but it was this series which made me say ‘one more.’

“Everyone gives a wry smile every time I say I’m going to stop. There’s a limit I suppose; I feel I can keep going and keep going but it’s high pressure to stay in the condition I need to be to compete at this level.

“We’ve got an 18-year-old in our team, Josh Edmondson, and I was probably already thinking of retiring when he was born.”

Elliott appears very much attached to his glory days, still sporting the permatan and bleached locks so prevalent in the 80s but more rare now on most men approaching their 50th year.

Equally undiminished is his love of the sport, the main factor behind his comeback after six years on the sidelines.

Having been a part of the first British trade team to race the tour in 1987 and seen the sport dip out of fashion in Britain he is naturally delighted to be involved in such buoyant times.

“Back in the 80s it was a euphoric time with the Kellogg’s races, there was a feeling that British cycling was hitting the big time, but that was just one race really and there was no depth behind it,” he said.

“Times got hard but now it’s considered if not a major sport in the U.K. then a sport of significance, which wasn’t the case when I was back in my prime, and this sort of event is just more evidence that the profile of cycling is so high.”