Early Life and Education
David Millar is one of two children of Gordon and Avril Millar. His father was a pilot in the Royal Air Force and Millar was born while his father was based in Malta for a 3 year tour of duty. His sister Frances also works in cycling, currently as the head of business operations for Team Sky. The family returned to the UK, and lived at RAF Kinloss in Scotland before moving to Aylesbury, 60 km north-west of London. His father and mother divorced when Millar was 11 and his father moved to Hong Kong when he joined Cathay Pacific, an airline, based there. Millar considers Hong Kong as his home. Millar moved to Hong Kong to join his father when he was 13. He rode in bmx bike races in Hong Kong "and did pretty well." He bought a road bike in 1992 and raced at 6.30 in the morning before the roads began filling with traffic.
At King George V School, he chose mathematics, economics and geography as his A-level, pre-university, examination subjects, then switched to art, graphics and sports studies at his father's suggestion. He completed his A-levels and, having moved back to England to be with his mother in Maidenhead, enrolled at an arts college. He started cycling with a club in High Wycombe, west of London. His mother, Avril, took him there so that he would make new friends and have something to do. Millar showed talent and at 18, a week before he was due to start at the arts college, he went to race in France. He joined a club at St-Quentin, in the Picardy region, and won eight races. Five professional teams offered him a contract. He signed with Cyrille Guimard because his team, Cofidis, was based in the area and he knew of Guimard's skill in recognising young talent.
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