After a beer and champagne celebration en route, the Team Sky rider remained combative to the end, sprinting to 11th place to ensure he claimed the green jersey in addition to white and red.
Froome won the race by an eventual margin of two minutes and 15 seconds and became the first rider since Bernard Hinault in 1978 to do the Tour de France and Vuelta double. However Froome is the first man to win both races in a single season in the modern era since the Vuelta moved to its current August start.
Spending an impressive 19 days in red after taking the lead following stage three in Andorra, Froome also secured the white combined classification jersey and battled until the end to make sure of green by just two points.
One of just four teams to finish with all nine riders, Froome was flawlessly supported across the three weeks by his team-mates. Wout Poels secured his best-ever Grand Tour result with sixth overall, and along with Mikel Nieve was instrumental in shepherding Froome in the high mountains. Diego Rosa and David Lopez provided superb support in the mountains, as did Gianni Moscon who excelled in his debut Grand Tour. Salvatore Puccio put in his strongest performance across a three-week race, with Christian Knees and Ian Stannard providing rock-solid backup on the flat and early climbs.
After climbing off the podium Froome attempted to sum up his feelings after an incredible achievement.
He said: "It's just an incredible feeling. I'm still coming to terms with everything. It's just been such a whirlwind and it's been such an incredible journey. Just the fact that nobody has ever won the Tour and then won the Vuelta afterwards, it's incredible to have been able to do it. Obviously I didn't do it alone, it was thanks to an amazing team behind me and thanks to so much support from everyone - from the fans, from my family and friends. It's just been an amazing few months and I want to thank everyone who has contributed to that.
"I've been fighting for this victory now for six years and three years I've been standing on the second step. It's just amazing to stand on the top step this time."
Froome also expanded on a battling run into Madrid which saw him fight to keep hold of his points jersey.
He explained: "Today in the final I figured this would probably be the only time in my life to try and win the green jersey of a Grand Tour, so I gave it everything I had and managed to get a few points at the finish there. Obviously I couldn't be happier with the result. I'm just a biker racer and of course if there's a competition to be won I'm going to go for it."
Victory is particularly sweet for Froome who has finished as a runner up in the race three times previously.
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