Froome was born on 20 May 1985 in Nairobi, Kenya, the youngest of three boys to mother Jane and English father Clive, a former field hockey player who represented England at under-19 level. His mother’s parents had emigrated from Tetbury, Gloucestershire, England to Kenya to run a crop farm. Whilst living abroad his parents maintained British customs with Sunday roast dinners and Beatles songs which contributed to his desire to represent Great Britain in cycling. In Kenya he would sell avocados and discarded bike parts. Froome’s two older brothers, Jonathan and Jeremy, went to Rugby School in Warwickshire, England. When Froome was 13, his mother took him to his first organised bike race, a charity race that he won despite being knocked from his bike by his mother. There he met professional cyclist David Kinjah, who became Froome’s mentor and training partner. Initially Kinjah misjudged Froome’s attitude, fearing he lacked the “work ethic to keep pace with more experienced riders of the group” His mother was upset with his cycling, often driving out ahead, attempting to drive him back home.

Froome turned professional in 2007, aged 22, with the South African team, Konica Minolta, withdrawing from university two years into his degree in economics. He competed from April to September in the U23 Nations Cup for the Union Cycliste Internationale’s World Cycling Centre (WCC) team based in Aigle, Switzerland. In May he rode his first stage race, the Giro delle Regioni, winning stage five, riding for WCC. In late-May he won stage six of the Tour of Japan, attacking from a breakaway in the fourteen-lap circuit in Shuzenji. In June he competed at the “B” world championships in Cape Town, placing second to China’s Haijun Ma in the 26.8-kilometre-long (16.7 mi) time trial. In July, he claimed a bronze medal in the road race at the All-Africa Games in Algiers, Algeria. On 26 September, he placed forty-first in the under-23 time trial at the world championships in Stuttgart, three minutes and thirty seconds behind the gold medalist, Lars Boom of the Netherlands. His performances in 2007 attracted the attention of British Cycling coach, Rod Ellingworth, who believed Froome had potential. Froome said: “Although I was riding under the Kenyan flag I made it clear that I had always carried a British passport and felt British. It was then we talked about racing under the Union Flag, and we stayed in touch.”

Froome was introduced to the British-based, South African-backed, second-tier UCI Professional Continental team, Barloworld, by South African Robbie Hunter, signing with them for the 2008 season. In March he finished second overall in the Giro del Capo in South Africa, one minute and forty-one seconds behind his teammate, Christian Pfannberger. Over March and April, he rode the Critérium International, Gent-Wevelgem and the Ardennes classics. In May 2008, Froome switched from a Kenyan licence to a British licence, to have a chance of riding in the 2008 Summer Olympics, where Kenya did not qualify. He made his Grand Tour debut when he was named in Barloworld’s squad for the Tour de France – becoming the first participant born in Kenya, in which he finished 84th overall and 11th among the young rider classification. In October, Froome finished fourth overall in the Herald Sun Tour in Victoria, Australia.

Froome claimed his next professional win in March 2009, with the second stage of the Giro del Capo in Durbanville, South Africa, attacking a ten-strong breakaway with 30 km (18.6 mi) and finishing four minutes ahead. He then participated in the Giro d’Italia, in which he came 36th overall, and seventh young rider classification. In July he won a minor one day race, Anatomic Jock Race, in Barberton South Africa. In September 2009, it was announced that he was to join British cycling team, Team Sky, for the 2010 season.

Froome met Michelle Cound, a South African of Welsh origin, through South African rider Daryl Impey in 2009. Froome and Cound moved to Monaco together in 2011 and got engaged in March 2013. The couple married in November 2014, and on 14 December 2015 had their first child, a son named Kellan. Froome dedicated his 2013 Tour de France win to his mother, who died of cancer five weeks before his Tour debut in 2008. His second child, a daughter named Katie, was born on 1 August 2018.

Later that year, it was revealed Froome had suffered throughout the year from the parasitic disease schistosomiasis, after having picked up the disease during a visit to Kenya in 2010. Brailsford speculated that the disease had affected Froome’s earlier career in a negative way. The discovery and subsequent treatment of the illness has been used to explain Froome’s rapid rise in form during 2011. He was part of the Great Britain team that helped Mark Cavendish win the world road race championship. In October, Froome finished third overall in the first edition of the Tour of Beijing, 26 seconds behind overall winner, Tony Martin.

After the Olympics, he was named in the start list for the 2016 Vuelta a España, during which he helped the team win the opening team time trial and later won stage 11 on Peña Cabarga, the site of his first Grand Tour stage victory in 2011. He lost over 2 and a half minutes on stage 15 when rivals Nairo Quintana and Alberto Contador attacked together from kilometre 10 and blew the race apart, isolating him from his teammates. However, Froome gained back time lost in a victory on the stage 19 individual time trial to Calp. He finished the Vuelta in second overall, 1:23 back of race winner Quintana.

Froome’s 2013 season began at the Tour of Oman, where he took the race lead on stage four, finishing second to Rodríguez on the summit finish of Jebel Akhdar. Froome then won the following stage to extend his lead, out-sprinting Contador and Rodríguez. He finished the race taking the overall classification, his first stage race win of his career, 27 seconds ahead of Contador, with Cadel Evans twelve seconds further back. He also won the points classification.

Following his 2013 and 2014 early-season victories in the Tour of Oman, Froome decided to begin his 2015 racing season in February at the Ruta del Sol in Spain. He was joined there by Contador, both riders competing in this race for the first time.

Since winning his first Tour de France title in 2013, doubts over Froome’s performances were raised by various experts, including former Festina coach Antoine Vayer. These allegations were based mainly on his sudden transformation from a relatively unknown rider to a Grand Tour winner, following his breakthrough performance in the 2011 Vuelta. After his dominant showing in the first mountain stage of 2015 Tour, the suspicions increased even further. In an attempt to answer these questions, Froome promised to undergo independent physiological testing soon after finishing the Tour. The test, arranged by Froome himself, took place shortly before the start of the Vuelta, on 17 August 2015, in the GlaxoSmithKline Human Performance lab in London. Several tests were carried to determine his maximum sustainable power for 20–40 minutes (threshold power), level of maximum oxygen consumption (VO2 max) and his peak power. Froome’s peak power was measured at 525 W; his peak 20–40-minute power, at 419 W, corresponds to 79.8 percent of the maximum. At his current weight of 69.9 kg (154 lb) (of which 9.8% was body fat) at the time of test, this corresponds to a figures of 7.51 and 5.98 W/kg respectively. His maximum oxygen uptake was measured at 84.6 ml/kg/min. At the time, he was reportedly almost 3 kg (6.6 lb) heavier compared to his Tour weight of 67 kg (148 lb). Using this number, the VO2 max figure would translate to approximately 88.2 ml/kg/min. He also released results from a previous test, carried out in 2007 while being part of the UCI development programme. The 2007 test measured his peak power at 540 W, the threshold power at 420 W and the maximum oxygen uptake of 80.2 ml/kg/min, at a weight of 75.6 kg (167 lb).

Froome was appointed as an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2016 New Year Honours for services to cycling.

Before the 2016 season, Froome announced that he would attempt to win the Tour, as well as the time trial and road race at the Olympics. Froome started the season early, competing in the 2016 Herald Sun Tour in Australia (a race in which he had finished fourth in 2008). The Herald Sun Tour consisted of a short individual time trial prologue, followed by four stages. On the last stage, which culminated in a triple climb of Arthurs Seat and a summit finish, Froome broke away in a solo attack on the third and final ascent, and opened up a sufficient gap on the field to secure his first 2016 victory, along with the King of the Mountains award.

On Stage 8 of the 2016 Tour de France, Froome attacked on the descent of the Col de Peyresourde and held off the leading group of GC contenders to take a solo victory in Bagnères-de-Luchon. By doing so, Froome took the Yellow Jersey, leading the race by 16 seconds over Adam Yates (Orica–BikeExchange). Following the stage, Froome received a fine of 200 Swiss Francs for elbowing a spectator in the face who had run alongside him during the ascent of the Col de Peyresourde. He further surprised his rivals on stage 11 to Montpellier when he finished second in a sprint to Peter Sagan, after being part of a 4-man break in the final 12 kilometers after the peloton split due to crosswinds. On Stage 12, on the ascent up Mont Ventoux, Froome collided with Richie Porte and Bauke Mollema and a motorbike after spectators on the road forced the motorbike to stop. Porte and Mollema continued riding, while Froome ditched his bike and continued on foot until receiving a replacement bike from his team car. He finished the race 1 minute and 40 seconds behind Mollema, but was awarded the same time as Mollema after a jury decision, and retained the yellow jersey. He followed with good results in both of the individual time trials with a second-place finish on stage 13 and winning stage 18. Froome went on to claim his third Tour de France victory on 24 July 2016 and became Britain’s first-ever three-time winner of the race.

Froome was appointed officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2016 New Year Honours for services to cycling.

Froome won his fourth Tour de France title on 23 July 2017. He beat Rigoberto Urán by 54 seconds. Although Froome never won a stage during the 2017 Tour or any prior race during that calendar year, he was victorious thanks to his exceptional time trialing abilities showcased on the Grand Depart in Düsseldorf and on stage 20 in Marseille.

On 19 August, Froome started the Vuelta a España aiming to win it having finished 2nd on three occasions previously and had gone in as the overwhelming favourite. On stage 3 Froome attacked up the final climb with only Esteban Chaves able to follow him. However, they were pegged back on the descent and Vincenzo Nibali won the stage in the reduced sprint. Froome finished 3rd and the bonus seconds at the line plus those he picked up at the intermediate sprint were enough to see him take the red jersey for the first time since 2011. He went on to win stage 9 at Cumbre del Sol (the same finish where he lost to Dumoulin in 2015), also taking the lead in the points classification in the process. Despite a crash on stage 12, he recaptured the lead in the points classification with a 5th-place finish on stage 15 to Sierra Nevada and won the stage 16 individual time trial at Logroño, also taking the stage’s combativity prize. A third-place finish on the Alto de l’Angliru cemented the red jersey as well as the combination classification, and on the final sprint stage at Madrid, held on to win the points classification by 2 points over Matteo Trentin. With the victory, Froome became the first British rider to win the Vuelta, and the third man to successfully complete the Tour-Vuelta double in the same year joining Jacques Anquetil and Bernard Hinault. He then competed at the 2017 UCI Road World Championships in Bergen only about a week after his Vuelta victory and won two bronze medals: one in the men’s team time trial with Team Sky, the other in the men’s individual time trial for Great Britain. On 17 October 2017, he won his third Vélo d’Or award as the best rider of the 2017 season.

On 13 December 2017, the UCI announced that Froome had returned an “Adverse Analytical Finding” (AAF) for almost twice his allowed dose of salbutamol, an asthma medication. Both the A and B samples revealed urinary salbutamol concentration in excess of the 1000–1200 ng/mL threshold of “therapeutic use”. The threshold for salbutamol is 1000 ng/mL and the decision limit, taking into account measurement uncertainty, is 1200 ng/mL. The test was taken after stage 18 of the Vuelta a España. In a statement, Froome commented: “My asthma got worse at the Vuelta so I followed the team doctor’s advice to increase my salbutamol dosage. As always, I took the greatest care to ensure that I did not use more than the permissible dose.” Under new WADA rules, compensation has been made for urine concentration and dehydration, under which Froome’s level has been lowered to 1,429 ng/mL rather than 2,000 ng/mL. Subsequently, Froome took much of the off-season contacting experts and reading reports on the situation.

On 29 November 2017, Froome announced that he intended to participate in the 2018 Giro d’Italia in an attempt to complete the Giro-Tour double, marking his first start in the race since 2010. A win would make him the seventh rider to win all three Grand Tours, and the third rider to hold all three Grand Tour titles simultaneously in a single 12-month period.

His case has been widely criticised by fellow cyclists and in January 2018 UCI president David Lappartient recommended that he was suspended by Team Sky until his case was resolved. In February 2018 Dave Brailsford defended Froome saying “For me, there’s no question, he’s done nothing wrong – no question, no question, no question.” He went on to say that he believed Froome was innocent and that he felt the case shouldn’t have been made public.

On 2 July 2018, the UCI officially closed the investigation into Froome, stating that the rider had supplied sufficient evidence to suggest that “Mr Froome’s sample results do not constitute an AAF”.

On 5 February 2018, Froome announced he would start his season with an entry into the Vuelta a Andalucía (Ruta del Sol), despite calls for him not to race until his case was resolved. However, there were also signs of support for Froome, with Ruta del Sol organiser Joaquín Cuevas claiming it to be “a pleasure and an honour” to have Froome in the race, and Mauro Vegni, the organiser of the Giro d’Italia, commenting that ‘If he [Froome] wins the pink jersey, he’ll always be the winner for me’. Cyclingnews.com also reported that Froome would be likely to compete in two Italian pre-Giro stage races: Tirreno–Adriatico and the Tour of the Alps.

Froome took victory in the 2018 Giro d’Italia making him the first British rider to win the overall title, the first rider since 1983 to hold all three Grand Tour titles simultaneously, as well as becoming the seventh man to have completed the career Grand Tour grand slam. He then went into the 2018 Tour de France as one of the main favorites for victory despite the mostly negative reactions from some fans. Crashing twice on stages 1 and 9 as well as looking vulnerable on several other stages, Froome then shifted his focus on helping his friend and longtime teammate Geraint Thomas. Thanks to his performance in the penultimate day time trial to Espelette, Froome finished third overall behind Thomas.

On stage seventeen, Froome attacked Cobo 1 km (0.6 mi) from the summit finish, but Cobo fought back, catching Froome in the final 300 metres, only for Froome to attack again to win the stage and arrive one second in front of Cobo. As a result of time bonuses, Froome reduced Cobo’s lead to thirteen seconds. Froome was unable to reduce Cobo’s lead any further and initially was placed second overall in the Vuelta. On 17 July 2019, Froome was declared the winner of the race following the disqualification of Cobo for drug offences. The win, retroactively, made him the first British rider to win a Grand Tour.

On 1 January 2019, Froome announced that he would not be defending his title at the Giro d’Italia, instead focusing on the 2019 Tour de France with the aim of winning the race for the fifth time. He started his season at Tour Colombia in February, and also rode the Volta a Catalunya in support of Egan Bernal. He completed the Tour of the Alps and the Tour de Yorkshire prior to returning to the Critérium du Dauphiné. On 12 June 2019, Froome was hospitalised with a fractured right femur, a fractured elbow, and fractured ribs, after a high-speed crash into a wall while training for the 4th stage of the Critérium du Dauphiné. The incident ruled out his participation in the 2019 Tour de France. He spoke for the first time on 3 August 2019 in an interview about the incident and the recovery process. On 10 September 2019, almost 3 months into his recovery, Froome was confirmed to participate in the 7th edition of the Saitama Criterium, and on 29 September 2019 posted to social media that he was back training on the road.

In his first official team interview posted on 17 January 2020, Froome confirmed that he had been given the green light to begin full training following the rehab stage of his recovery and participated in a training camp with several teammates in Gran Canaria, citing his big focus as getting to the 2020 Tour de France with the ambition of getting his fifth overall victory. On 22 January, it was announced that Froome’s first race back would be the UAE Tour at the end of February, rejoining the peloton for the first time since his accident.

On 9 July 2020, it was announced that Froome’s contract with Team Ineos would not be extended beyond the end of the 2020 season, having been with the team since its formation in 2010. Later that day, Froome signed a “long-term” contract with Israel Start-Up Nation from the 2021 season.

Following the end of the lockdown, Froome completed the Route d’Occitanie, the Tour de l’Ain and the Critérium du Dauphiné. On 19 August 2020, it was announced that he would not be part of the team for the Tour de France, but would instead be the team’s designated leader at the Vuelta a España, which would eventually be his final race with Ineos.