In 1999, riding for Birkenhead North End CC as a junior, aged 17, he won the
Eddie Soens Memorial Road Race, a handicap race open to all categories. It remains the only time that a junior rider has won the race.[7] He went on to take the junior
British National Road Race Championships that year.[7]
Representing his country Cummings won the team pursuit at the
2005 UCI Track Cycling World Championships in Los Angeles and at the
2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne with the British and English cycling teams respectively. He also took bronze in the individual pursuit at the 2006 Commonwealth Games. At the
2004 Olympics in Athens Cummings and the Great Britain team won the silver medal in the
team pursuit and achieved a time of 3:59.866 in the heats.
The following year saw Cummings take a single victory in the third
Giro del Capo challenge,[17] with other top-five finishes at the Giro della Provincia di Reggio Calabria (fifth),[18] and the Coppa Bernocchi (fourth).[19] Despite this, Barloworld folded at the end of the season.[11][20]
In September 2011, Cummings signed a contract with the
BMC Racing Team for the 2012 season.[2] The following February, Cummings broke his
pelvis in an accident while competing in the
Volta ao Algarve.[30] In April, bad luck struck again when he fractured his left wrist in the
Tour of the Basque Country.[31] He recuperated from those injuries and competed in the
Tour de France, where he was a
domestique to his leader
Cadel Evans and finished 95th overall.[32] In the
Vuelta a España, he gained his first
Grand Tour stage victory. On
Stage 13, he broke away with six other riders after the first hour of racing. The break made it through on the mainly flat course and he attacked with about 4 kilometres (2.5 miles) to race, creating a gap. He held on to his lead and won by four seconds over the two chasers,
Cameron Meyer of
Orica–GreenEDGE and
Team Sky's
Juan Antonio Flecha.[33] He completed his season with a stage victory on the final day of the
Tour of Beijing,[34] getting the better of
Ryder Hesjedal in a sprint à deux in
Pinggu.
In October 2014, Cummings announced that he would be joining
MTN–Qhubeka for the 2015 season.[39] In his first race with the team, Cummings won the Trofeo Andratx-Mirador d'Es Colomer one-day race, held as part of the season-opening
Vuelta a Mallorca; he attacked on the final climb of the race, and was able to fend off
Alejandro Valverde in the closing metres for the win.[40] He recorded top-ten overall finishes at the
Tirreno–Adriatico and
Circuit de la Sarthe stage races in the spring, finishing sixth in both events.[41][42] In July, Cummings won
stage 14 of the
Tour de France, beating French riders
Thibaut Pinot and
Romain Bardet to the line at the
Mende Aerodrome, after the trio had gone clear at the top of the Côte de la Croix Neuve – a second-category climb with 1.5 kilometres (0.93 miles) remaining.[43] It was the first
Tour de France stage win for both Cummings and his South African team MTN–Qhubeka, with the result coming on
Mandela Day.[44]
2016
In his first start of the 2016 season, Cummings won the fourth stage of March's
Tirreno–Adriatico; having been part of the breakaway, Cummings attacked with approximately 3 kilometres (1.9 miles) remaining of the 222-kilometre (138-mile) stage to
Foligno, and soloed to a 13-second winning margin over his closest competitors.[45] The following month, he won the third stage of the
Tour of the Basque Country, outfoxing the peloton with a move with 1 kilometre (0.62 miles) to go, and held on to win by several metres in
Lesaka.[46] In his final warm-up race prior to the
Tour de France, Cummings won the final stage of the
Critérium du Dauphiné, having attacked with 50 kilometres (31 miles) remaining on the fourth of the day's six categorised climbs, and ended up winning the stage by almost four minutes.[47]
After six stages of July's Tour de France, Cummings had lost almost 45 minutes to the race leader
Greg Van Avermaet, and was in 191st place out of the 198 competitors.[48] On the seventh stage, Cummings took another breakaway win, having dropped his breakaway companions just before the intermediate sprint at
Sarrancolin; he would go on to win the stage at
Lac de Payolle by 64 seconds, over
Daryl Impey and
Daniel Navarro.[49][50] In the same month, he was named to
Great Britain's cycling team for the
Olympic Games in Rio – replacing
Peter Kennaugh for the
road race.[7][51] Cummings had previously been left out of the team when it was announced at the beginning of the month, and had lobbied to the British media for coach
Rod Ellingworth to quit – due to his involvement with
Team Sky, with four riders from the team forming part of the five-man British squad.[52]
He then rode his home race, the
Tour of Britain, as part of Team Dimension Data alongside
Mark Cavendish.[53] On the second stage in
Cumbria, Cummings was part of a group that broke clear on the
Kirkstone Pass to chase down the breakaway; a small lead group was formed on the run-in to
Kendal, and only
Julien Vermote was able to follow the attacks put in by Cummings.[54] Cummings led up the final climb in Kendal, but Vermote pulled clear as the gradient eased and took the stage win and the leader's jersey,[55] while Cummings gained approximately a minute on his main general classification rivals.[56] Cummings took over the race lead following the sixth stage,[57] a summit finish at
Haytor, as Vermote lost around 90 seconds to him. Despite
Rohan Dennis taking time off him in both of the stages held in
Bristol on the penultimate day,[58] Cummings maintained his race lead and ultimately won the race for the first time – the first home win since
Bradley Wiggins in
2013 – by 26 seconds from Dennis.[59] Writing for The Guardian, journalist
William Fotheringham considered this win for Cummings as the most important stage race victory of his career up to that date.[60]
Cummings endured a difficult 2018 season, recording no top-10 finishes, and suffering health issues with an injury to the
head of his left fibula at the
Tour of Austria,[64] and breathing problems at the
Critérium du Dauphiné.[64] In 2019, Cummings finished in third place at the British National Time Trial Championships in
Norfolk,[65] and also finished in tenth place overall at the
Arctic Race of Norway,[66] but injury and illnesses continued to effect Cummings.[67] Later in the year at the
Tour of Britain – and having featured in the final selection on the fourth stage[68] – on home roads in the
Metropolitan Borough of Wirral, Cummings was involved in a crash some 50 kilometres (31 miles) from the finish of the fifth stage.[69] He was later diagnosed with four fractured
vertebrae in his back, ending his season.[7][70]
Retirement, directeur sportif
In November 2019, Cummings announced his retirement from professional cycling.[71]
In February 2021 Cummings announced that he was returning to Team Sky, since renamed as
Ineos Grenadiers, joining the team's management as a development
directeur sportif and coach.[6] In December 2023, he was appointed as the team's director of racing from the 2024 season onwards.[72]
^"Cav sprints to London win". Sky Sports.
Sky UK. 18 September 2011. Retrieved 17 December 2023. Steve Cummings took a comfortable second place for Team Sky after his exploits in the earlier time trial had seen him rise three places on the leaderboard [...]