Peter Kennaugh emerged as a crucial part of the powerful Sky train that assisted Chris Froome during last year's Tour de France and the Brit has now got the taste for more. Hoping to take over Richie Porte's role at the British team and chase a few personal results along the way, the Brit will try to step up his game even further in 2014.

Peter Kennaugh has long been known as one of Great Britain's greatest cycling talents but due to his track commitments, it took some time for him to reveal his potential to a larger cycling audience. Having already shown his capabilities in last year's Criterium du Dauphiné, he earned himself a spot on the Sky roster for the Tour de France and this was where the cycling world learnt about the full extent of his capabilities.

On the first mountain stage of the race to Ax-3-Domaines, usually reliable domestiques like David Lopez and Kanstantsin Siutsou had not lived up to their usual very high level and it left Sky a bit short in numbers as they tried to shred the peloton to pieces on the Port de Pailheres that preceded the final climb to the finish. Kennaugh was the rider to step up his game and the Brit set in the second half of the climbing and led the diminished front group down the descent before leaving the final work to Froome and Richie Porte who ultimately make it a 1-2 for the British team.

The next day Kennaugh had a memorable crash early in the stage and his absence was dearly felt in a race that saw Froome become isolated already from the gun and Porte drop out of GC contention. Kennaugh went on to play a crucial role for the rest of the race and was rewarded for his efforts when Froome stood atop the podium in Paris.

Kennaugh has already started his 2014 season strongly, performing excellently in support of Porte in the recent Vuelta a Andalucia and he has kick started a campaign that he hopes will culminate with a return to France this summer. This year he hopes to step up his game even further, maybe becoming the final man to launch Froome's decisive attacks.

“That was a highlight for me,” he told TeamSky.com when speaking about the Tour. “That’s why I’ve been more motivated than ever this season, because now I’ve had a taste of what it’s all about - riding onto the Champs-Elysees and experiencing stages like Mont Ventoux and Alpe d’Huez. My performances there gave me a lot of confidence going into this year. I’m fitter than ever and ready to go again.

"I’d love to try and step into the area Richie (Porte) is in - going further onto the climbs. But it’s not just about the Tour this year as I’ve been working a lot on my time trialling. I want to progress my stage racing abilities and see if I can maybe get a win or some GC placings in other races.

"I just want to keep my head down and let the legs do the talking. I’m not one to say ‘I want to do this’ and just put pressure on myself for no reason."
 

Kennaugh has very few personal results on his palmares but hopes to get his chance during the spring to develop his own stage race capabilities.

"You can’t just go on what you did last year," he reasons. "I’ll have to prove myself in the first couple of races this season and hopefully I can get an opportunity. I’ve got Coppa Bartali on my programme this year and I think it’s quite a young team there - maybe a race like that I could be more of an influence rather than just getting around.

"Basically, it's about being fit enough and ready to race rather than playing catch-up, which I was doing for a lot of last year."
 

The reason for that playing catch-up was a niggling heel injury from which he has finally recovered.

"I had an ongoing heel injury for pretty much the whole season last year. I was able to race with it as it was only niggling, but I didn’t feel that I could perform to the best of my ability.

"After the Tour I was racing but it wasn’t getting any better. In the end we made the decision to call it a day and get it sorted once and for all, with a view to being ready to go for this year, rather than trying and push through to the worlds.

"I came back in November, went to Calpe in Spain, and got into a good routine. Since then I’ve been pretty switched on. [The heel therapy] has done the job. I’ve been able to train harder, longer and better than I’ve been able to do any other winter. I’ve been really consistent with my training."

It is still not known when Kennaugh will do his next race.