Herald Scotland's sports team trawls through the archives for the very best stories from yesteryear
Herald Scotland's sports team trawls through the archives for the very best stories from yesteryear
CHRIS HOY made a successful return to competition by winning the first British sprint title of his career at the grand old age of 33.
The Scot added the national trophy to the Olympic gold he won in the event last August by beating defending champion Matt Crampton in the final.
The victory, together with a track record of 9.99 seconds in the flying 200 metres which makes up the sprint's qualifying round, proves Hoy is completely recovered from the serious hip injury which cut last season short.
"To do a 9.99 is great - we've had the world championships here three times and no-one's gone that fast," he said. "A track record, a championship record, my second-fastest ever time. I'm really pleased with that."
Hoy took part in an exhibition event in France in August but this was the first time he had competed since crashing at the Copenhagen leg of the TrackWorld Cup in March.
The fall, caused when the French rider Kevin Sireau flicked out an elbow as Hoy tried to overtake him in the keirin final, meant he missed the chance to defend two of his titles at March's World Championships in Poland.
When his hip slammed against the track, it caused a degloving injury, where the skin gets separated from the underlying muscle, and he had to stay off his bike for over 10 weeks or risk permanent damage.
However, he showed no fear of injury last night as he swooped around the track to see off fellow Scot Ross Edgar in the semi-final then Crampton in straight 2-0 wins.
"If you had fear, you would have fear in training because of the speeds you go at," Hoy said. "It's the furthest thing from my mind and you accept it as part of the sport. It's just one of the things you deal with."
Hoy's Great Britain teammate Jason Queally never raced anything other than time-trials, events in which you have the track to yourself, after a crash at Meadowbank Stadium in Edinburgh in 1996 left him with an 18 inch splinter sticking out his chest. He was treated trackside by Hoy's mother Carol, a nurse, as both the Scot's parents are stalwarts of the local track scene in his home town. Hoy, though, laughed off the idea that his crash would have dissuaded him from returning to racing.
"The thing with Jason was, he came to the sport late and it happened very early in his career so it was quite a traumatic thing to happen," Hoy said. "But if you've been racing bikes all your life and you've grown up on a diet of mountain bikes, BMX bikes and you fall off every second day, it's not such a big deal. But for Jason that was a big shock. He'd been a water polo player. The worst you get there is getting your undercarriage squeezed by a big man."
Hoy's victory came in probably the most competitive sprint competition ever staged in the national championships.
As well as Crampton, four-time Olympic champion Hoy was up against Jason Kenny, the man he beat in the Beijing final, and Edgar, also an Olympic silver medallist.
In the night's other events, Lizzie Armitstead won the women's scratch while Geraint Thomas won the pursuit in a hugely impressive 4min 18.418sec, which would have been enough to win a world championship most years.
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