‘A significant moment in Australian sporting history’: Jai Hindley joins greats with Giro d’Italia win

For over a decade now, Cadel Evans has stood alone in Australia’s cycling pantheon as the only Australian to have won a cycling grand tour. With a history that dates back to the early 1900s, across a collective 288 editions of the Tour de France, Giro d’Italia and Vuelta a España, only once had an Australian stood atop a grand tour podium at the end of 21 gruelling stages.

No longer. On Sunday, Hindley matched Evans’s historic 2011 Tour de France triumph with Giro d’Italia glory in Verona. The 26-year-old from Perth, who says that being a professional cyclist was all he ever dreamed about, became only the second Australian to win the general classification at a grand tour.

Related: Jai Hindley puts Giro d’Italia ghosts to rest with emphatic victory in Verona

It is a truly elite sporting accomplishment – on par with winning a tennis grand slam, or a handful of Olympic gold medals. Whatever else Hindley achieves in his career, he will always be remembered as the first Australian to win the Giro and the first to follow in Evans’s momentous footsteps.

“It is a really big achievement – it is hard to get your head around the fact an Australian has finally won this race,” SBS cycling commentator Matt Keenan said, just hours after calling the race. “It is a privilege to get to call a significant moment in Australian sporting history.”

Hindley’s triumph is all the more remarkable given the worrying sense of deja vu that had lingered over his campaign for the pink leader’s jersey. Two years ago, the West Australian announced himself to the world with second place overall at the Giro, a shock result for a rider who had been relatively unheralded. But that success, until now the best Giro result by an Australian, was tinged with