Chris Froome belatedly received the red jersey for the 2011 Vuelta a Espana winner on Thursday and admitted it felt "a bit strange".

Team INEOS rider Froome was named champion this July after Juan Jose Cobo was stripped of the race victory following the expiration of a deadline for the now-retired rider to appeal against a UCI suspension for a doping offence.

Cobo beat the Kenya-born Briton by 13 seconds at the Vuelta eight years ago but the title changed hands after a three-year ban for the Spaniard was confirmed.

Froome was consequently upgraded to a seven-time Grand Tour champion, though he acknowledged missing out on the chance celebrate being the first Briton to triumph at the top level was frustrating, with Bradley Wiggins winning the 2012 Tour de France. 

"This title, this red jersey really does mean a lot to me," said Froome, who will not take part in this year's Vuelta due to the fractures to his right femur, elbow and ribs he sustained before Tour de France. "That race back in 2011 was incredibly special for me.

"It was the race that I first started to believe in myself as a Grand Tour contender. It was the race where I had my first professional victory and I've got some really special memories.

"To be named the winner eight years on does feel a bit strange on the one hand, but at the same time it's a really special one to add to my palmares.

"It would've been so different had I actually won it back then. Being able to stand on that podium in Madrid and soak up the feeling of winning my first Grand Tour and being the first British rider to ever win a Grand Tour, that would've been an amazing feeling."