2024 BBC Sports Personality of the Year odds: Luke Littler rated main threat to Olympic champion Keely Hodgkinson

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Where to watch 2024 BBC Sports Personality of the Year

BBC One & BBC iPlayer
7pm, Tuesday, December 17

Best bet

Alex Yee to win Sports Personality of the Year without Keely Hodgkinson
1pt 3-1 Coral, Ladbrokes

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2024 BBC Sports Personality of the Year odds

Here are the latest odds ahead of 2024 BBC Sports Personality of the Year on Tuesday, December 17

Odds correct at time of publishing

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2024 BBC Sports Personality of the Year preview

Keely Hodgkinson outclassed her rivals to win the 800m at the Paris Olympics and bookmakers reckon the Team GB star is well clear in the race to be crowned BBC Sports Personality of the Year.

The award will be presented on Tuesday, December 17 and Hodgkinson, who also won an Olympic silver as a teenager in Tokyo, is just 2-7 for glory.

She is hoping to become the fourth successive female winner, after tennis player Emma Raducanu and England footballers Beth Mead and Mary Earps, while athletics has produced 18 SPOTY winners – ten more than any other sport.

Hodgkinson's main market rival is teenage darts sensation Luke Littler, who reached the final of the Paddy Power World Darts Championship in January and has established himself as the face of the sport during his debut season.

However, it could be worth backing another Olympic hero, Alex Yee, to chase home Hodgkinson. The BBC never knowingly undersell the Olympics during their end-of-year bash and south Londoner Yee followed up his dramatic triathlon gold in Paris by winning the world title in October.

Fellow triathlete Alistair Brownlee finished as SPOTY runner-up to Andy Murray in 2016, another Olympic year, and Yee merits a small bet to repeat Brownlee's feat. 

Here is Racing Post Sport's guide to the leading contenders for the prestigious BBC award.

Keely Hodgkinson

Hodgkinson was the subject of a shrewd SPOTY plunge shortly before the Olympics. Her odds were clipped from 14-1 to 4-1 after she broke the national record at London's Diamond League meeting in July and she was slashed to 8-15 having struck gold in Paris.

Fellow Team GB athletes Matthew Hudson-Smith, Josh Kerr and Katarina Johnson-Thompson won silver medals at the Olympics but Hodgkinson's was the only British gold in athletics and the summer gamble on her is unlikely to go astray.    

Luke Littler

Luke Littler and Hodgkinson were 4-1 joint-favourites for SPOTY at the start of the Olympics but The Nuke was eased to 13-2 after the Paris Games.

However, with the festive darts frenzy about to grip the nation again, Littler is a solid second-favourite despite the fact that world number one Luke Humphries, who beat him in January's final at Ally Pally, is a 200-1 chance.

Arrers fans would love to see Littler – the dauphin of darts, the kebab king – join Princess Anne and Zara Phillips on the SPOTY roll of honour.

Realistically, though, the betting may overrate his appeal to the BBC electorate given that none of his triumphs have been available to watch on terrestrial TV. 

Mark Cavendish

The 39-year-old cyclist is respected by bookies, having enjoyed a couple of memorable moments in his final year as a professional.

The Manx Missile broke Eddy Merckx's long-standing record of 34 Tour de France stage wins in the summer and signed off his illustrious career with victory in November's Singapore Criterium.

However, Cavendish won SPOTY in his pomp in 2011 so voters may not feel obliged to support him again as a farewell gesture.

Ben Ainslie

Sir Ben Ainslie is the most successful sailor in Olympic history although his most recent gold medal came in 2012.

In October he skippered Ineos Britannia, the UK's first representative in the America's Cup for 60 years, prompting his SPOTY odds to be cut. The British public loves a ruddy-cheeked, nautical knight of the realm but Britannia's 7-2 defeat to New Zealand means others are preferred to Ainslie in this market.

Sarah Storey

Dame Sarah Storey won two cycling gold medals at the Paris Paralympics, extending her record-breaking haul to 19 golds: five in swimming and 14 in cycling.

Storey's remarkable longevity is illustrated by the fact that she is 27 years older than rival Heidi Gaugain, who finished second to her in the C4-5 road race in Paris. 

It would not be a huge surprise if she made the SPOTY podium but most bookmakers are going win only at this stage.

Other contenders

Alex Yee, the Olympic and world triathlon champion has been highlighted as a potential SPOTY runner-up to Hodgkinson in a betting heat that lacks star quality.

Few of Team GB's successes in Paris were in box-office events although Tom Pidcock, who retained his mountain-bike title in dramatic fashion, is another Olympian who should make the shortlist.

Jude Bellingham and Harry Kane's hopes of emulating fellow footballers Mead and Earps were undermined by England's Euro 2024 final defeat to Spain.

Cricketer Stuart Broad was runner-up last year, having retired at the end of an eventful Ashes series, but fellow fast bowler Jimmy Anderson, England's record Test wicket-taker, had a more understated exit against the West Indies.

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