Sir Bradley Wiggins wrapped up victory in the Tour of California as his fellow Briton Mark Cavendish sprinted to the final-stage win. Wiggins came home in the front group at the end of the 121.7km eighth stage to finish the race 30 seconds ahead of the Garmin-Sharp rider Rohan Dennis and secure his first win of the season.

Wiggins took the general classification lead in the second stage, a time trial last Monday, and was never seriously challenged. "It's right up there," he told the NBC Sports Network, when asked how highly he rated his victory. "It's always an honour to win the yellow jersey. I set my stall out to win the Tour of California and I've done that now. At 34 it's nice to still be winning."

He paid tribute to his Sky team-mates. "You can't do it on your own and, strong as my performance was individually in the time trial, my team have taken the strain all week," he said. "Those young Americans in my team – Joe [Dombrowski], Ian [Boswell] and Danny [Pate] – have done a fantastic job. Even today they didn't give up the chase and came back after they'd been distanced on the climbs. This is a fantastic way to finish."

Wiggins said that, if he rode in the Tour de France in July, it would be in support of his Sky team-mate Chris Froome. "Chris wants to win a second tour and I think everyone's behind that, including myself, and he's defending champion and he's earned the right to do that. [If] I am fortunate enough to be at the tour it will be in support of Chris. I continue to stand by that."

On the final stage in California, seven riders managed to edge clear of the pack after a frantic opening, with Niki Terpstra (Omega Pharma-QuickStep) and Jack Bobridge (Belkin) breaking away from that group on the second climb. But the pair were hauled in on the next ascent and the Team Sky riders were able to respond to further attacks to keep Wiggins well-placed.

Cavendish lost contact with the group late in the race but his Omega Pharma team-mates worked hard to bring him back with around 10km to go and then give him the platform to launch his sprint finish. The Manxman stayed on the wheel of Peter Sagan (Cannondale) before bursting through to take his second stage win of the race. "I'm in the form of my life," he said.