June 2025

David Beckham 2001

Admin June 14, 2025

At the time of writing, Sir David Beckham, 50, has recently been awarded a knighthood for services to sport and charity in King Charles’ Birthday Honours List. That decision has proved divisive but, the best part of a quarter of a century ago, in his playing days, his election as BBC Sports Personality of the Year (SPOTY) 2001 was far less equivocal.

Notwithstanding winning the Premiership for the third season running with his club, Manchester United, in 2000/01, Beckham, then 26, had scored a spectacular, injury-time free-kick for England against Greece at Old Trafford in early October, thereby earning a 2-2 draw and securing the Three Lions’ place in the 2002 FIFA World Cup in South Korea and Japan the following summer. That effort alone, well-timed as it was, just two months before the SPOTY ceremony, was enough to sway the majority of the three-quarters of a million, or more, telephone voters on the night.

The result was hardly a surprise, but the England captain beat round-the-world yachtswoman Ellen MacArthur into second place and England teammate Michael Owen – who won the Ballon D’Or – into third. Tennis player Tim Henman, boxer Lennox Lewis and triple jumper Jonathan Edwards completed the shortlist of six nominees for the coveted prize.

Fittingly, Beckham was presented with the trophy by his England manager Sven Goran Eriksson. Beckham was quick to thank Eriksson and Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson, adding, “Most of all I would like to thank my wife [Victoria], who has been behind me all the time and obviously my son [Brooklyn], who watches me, every game.” Earlier in the two-hour television special, Eriksson himself had collected the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Coach Award, after guiding the England team to the aforementioned World Cup.

At the World Cup, England progressed to the knockout stages, with Beckham scoring a penalty in a 1-0 win over Argentina at the Sapporo Dome in the second of three group matches. England eventually lost 2-1 to Brazil in the quarter-finals, but Beckham went on to make 115 appearances for the national team, placing him third on the all-time list behind Peter Shilton, with 125, and Wayne Rooney, with 120.

Damon Hill 1996 & 1994

Admin June 14, 2025

Damon Hill is, of course, the son of Graham Hill, who won the Formula One World Drivers’ Championship in 1962 and 1968. Indeed, Hill Jr. himself was Formula One World Champion in 1996 and has the distinction of being one of just a handful of sportspeople to be voted BBC Sports Personality of the Year more than once. In fact, at the time of his second award – which coincided with his one and only drivers’ championship in 1996 – he was just the third, after boxer Sir Henry Cooper (1967, 1970) and fellow racing driver Nigel Mansell (1986, 1992).

On that second occasion, Hill beat rower Steve Redgrave and jockey Lanfranco ‘Frankie’ Dettori into second and third place, respectively, in the public voter. Having accepted the trophy from the 1995 winner, triple jumper Jonathan Edwards, he said, “This really has made my year for me. I feel enormously proud to win this award, to stand here amongst the cream of our country’s sportsmen. It is a humbling experience.”

Hill competed in Formula One between 1992 and 1999, but the 1996 season was his most successful. He won eight of the 16 Grand Prix contested during the season and eventually topped the drivers’ table 19 points ahead of his nearest rival, Williams-Renault teammate Jacques Villeneuve.

Hill had previously finished runner-up in the Formula One World Drivers’ Championship in 1994 and 1995, behind Michael Schumacher on both occasions and, controversially, by just a single point in 1994. Schumacher was widely blamed, including by Hill himself, for causing a collision between the two during the final race of the season, the Australian Grand Prix in Adelaide, forcing the retirement of both drivers and, effectively, handing the title to the German.

At the end of a tragic Formula One season, which saw the deaths of rookie Roland Ratzenberger and Williams-Renault teammate Ayrton Senna during the San Marino Grand Prix at Imola, being voted BBC Sports Personality of the Year 1994 may have provided scant consolation for Hill. That he was, though, beating athletes Sally Gunnell and Colin Jackson in the public vote.

2008 Sir Chris Hoy

Admin June 5, 2025

Sir Chris Hoy was knighted for services to sport in the 2009 New Years Honours but, in a memorable year, was also voted BBC Sports Personality of the Year 2008. Edinburgh-born Hoy had been the subject of a media campaign in his native Scotland but, nonetheless, polled nearly 40% of the public vote, to beat racing driver Lewis Hamilton and swimmer Rebecca Adlington – both of whom were better-fancied by the bookmakers – into second and third place respectively.

At the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, Hoy won three gold medals at the Laoshan Velodrome, in the keirin, the individual sprint and the team sprint, alongside Jason Kenny and Jamie Staff. He thus became the first Briton since swimmer Henry Taylor – who won the 400 metre freestyle, 4 x 200 metre freestyle and the 1500 metre freestyle at the 1908 Summer Olympics in London – two win three gold medals at a single Games. He subsequently became the first cyclist to be named BBC Sports Personality of the Year since Tommy Simpson, who won the UCI Road World Championships, in 1965.

After accepting the trophy from four-time Olympic gold medallist Michael Johnson, Hoy, 32, said, “

I’m just overwhelmed. This is incredible.” His victory may have delivered the third suprise in as many years, after equestrian Zara Phillips in 2006 and boxer Joe Calzaghe in 2007 but, in his defence, he had just become the most successful male Olympic cyclist of all time. In fact, he would remain that way until his former teammate Jason Kenny (by then Sir Jason) won the keirin event at the postponed 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo in 2021 to increase his tally to seven gold medals.

Hoy retired from competitive cycling in 2013 as a six-time Olympic champion but, as a bleak footnote, was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2023, which he later revealed to be terminal. Nevertheless, he attended Sports Personality Of The Year 2024 along with his wife Sarra Kemp and delivered a heartfelt speech, in which he praised the dedication shown by Olympic and Paralympic athletes. He said, “1460 days of pure obsession for a single event. But let me tell you, it’s worth it.”

2010 Sir Anthony McCoy

Admin June 5, 2025

Sir Anthony McCoy was knighted in the 2016 New Year Honours, having won the National Hunt Jockeys’ Championship 20 years in a row prior to his retirement, with 4,358 winners to his name, the previous April. However, in 2010, he finally won the Grand National, after 14 previous unsuccessful attempts, and was promoted to favouritism for BBC Sports Personality of the Year.

He duly won the prestigious title, beating darts player Phil Taylor and heptathlete Jessica Ennis into second and third place respectively, from a shortlist that also included cyclist Mark Cavendish, diver Tom Daley, boxer David Haye, golfers Graeme McDowell and Lee Westwood, cricketer Graeme Swann and skeleton bobsleigh racer Amy Williams. In so doing, McCoy, who hails from Moneyglass in Country Antrim, Northern Ireland, became the first jockey – and just the fourth equestrian, after David Broome in 1960, the Princess Royal in 1971 and her daughter, Zara Phillips, in 2006 – to win the award. McCoy, himself, had finished in third place in 2002, the year in which he Sir Gordon Richards’ long-standing record of 269 winners in a season, set in 1947, as had fellow jockey Lanfranco “Frankie” Detttori in 1996.

Despite polling over 40% of the public vote, after accepting the trophy from Cesc Fàbregas, McCoy, 36, said, “I am dazed,” before continuing, “This is an unbelievable feeling to be standing in front of so many amazing sports people. To win this award is very surreal. Without the help of so many people I wouldn’t be here.”

McCoy went on to reflect on the moment he won the Grand National on Don’t Push It, owned by John ‘J.P.’ Mcmanus and trained by Jonjo O’Neill, who were both in attendance at the ceremony. He said, “When I started off as a jockey I wanted to be champion jockey and having been lucky enough to be champion jockey for 15 years I wanted to break records.I just felt that winning the Grand National, as the biggest horse race in the world, I felt it was just an unbelievable day.” His victory at Aintree on April 10, 2010 reportedly cost bookmaker William Hill an estimated £10 million.