Chris Hoy – 1 gold (2004) & 1 silver (2000) 
Allan Wells – 1 gold & 1 silver (1980)

We’re one month closer to Beijing.  There are now less than 100 days to go until the action commences.  Will Scotland be celebrating?  Well, if the recent performances by one of this month’s Scottish Olympic Legends are anything to go by, a Scot will be coming home with at least one medal!

Chris Hoy is, quite simply, Scotland’s greatest cyclist.  Indeed, if his form from the World Track cycling championships in March continues onto the China Olympics, he could become Scotland’s greatest ever Olympian.  But, for now, he joins our list in joint fourth place. 

Alongside him is another man who truly deserves the mantle of ‘legend,’ the only Scot to have ever won the 100m sprint title at the Olympics, Allan Wells.

Both these behemoths of the short-course race circuit have one gold and one silver medal in their trophy cabinets.  Hoy won silver in the team sprint at the Sydney Games in 2000, alongside fellow Scot Craig MacLean, before storming to gold and becoming the unprecedented ‘King of the kilo,’ breaking the Sea Level record in a World Best Time of 1.00.711.

Chris always had a competitive instinct within him, and the sporting ability to match.  He recalls his days at Edinburgh’s George Watson’s College, where even though he was regularly trampled by bigger players, he never ever quit or backed out on the testing ground that is the school rugby pitch.  Before he had left school, he had also become a Scottish Champion and European No 5 in BMX, and represented his country at junior level in the Coxless Pairs rowing event.

He took up regular cycling in 1992, and two years later started concentrating on the track side of the sport.  By 1996, aged just 20, he was in the GB team and riding for the City of Edinburgh Racing Club, based out of Meadowbank stadium.

At Sydney 2000, spurred on by the Opening Day success of British team-mate Jason Queally, who won gold in the kilometre, Chris, along with fellow Scot Craig MacLean and Queally, sped to a silver medal, narrowly missing out on gold to France, a team that included Hoy’s greatest rival, Arnaud Tournant.

After grabbing a Commonwealth gold medal at the Manchester Games and becoming World Champion in his favoured event, the kilometre in 2002, (or ‘Kilo’ as it is known in cycling circles) Hoy went into the Athens Olympics as the hot favourite for gold, certainly aided by his retention of the world title earlier in the year.  And he didn’t disappoint. 

In a thrilling race, Hoy defeated Tournant by less than 0.00002 of a second in an Olympic record time of 1min 0.711seconds.  That’s pretty fast for a bike – 60km per hour.  It also set the sea level world record for the event.  It was one of the most electrifying finals in the history of one of the Olympics’ most exciting events.  Yet, not long after Hoy achieved his greatest glory so far, the IOC decided that the kilo would no longer be an event in the Games, being replaced by an event from, ironically, Chris’s old event, BMX.

Still, not only does he now remain the reigning Olympic kilo champion for the foreseeable, the real McHoy is bang on form going into the Beijing Games.  He won two gold medals at the World Championships in March – the Keirin and the men’s sprint.  Here’s hoping he’ll come home from China with one or two more...

Allan Wells, meanwhile, is probably not going to bring home any more medals for Scotland, being as he is in his mid 50s.  But he is certainly responsible for one of Scotland’s most notable gold medals. 

Wells won both of his medals in the space of a few days at the 1980 Olympic Games in cold war capital Moscow.  He dashed to a photo-finish 100m gold in a time of 10.25 seconds, in front of his screaming wife in the Lenin Stadium, and hundreds of thousands of Scottish fans back home watching on television.  He then went on to claim 200m silver in a British record time a few days later.

It was a politically torn Games, much as how this year’s event in Beijing is shaping up.  The Soviet Union was seen as the biggest military threat to the Western World, and they had just embarked upon a controversial invasion of Afghanistan.  Major nations such as the USA, China, West Germany, Canada and Japan all boycotted the event.

But there was still plenty of quality left in the field, and Wells’ competition for a sprinting gold was fierce as ever, including Poland’s Marian Woronin, Silvio Leonard of Cuba, local lad Aleksandr Aksinin and Bulgaria’s Petar Petrov.  But Wells had always been intensely competitive, and was eager for the challenge.  He never let up on anyone, not even his wife, Margo, as he recalls. 

On a fortnight’s holiday to Magaluf with Margot in 1976, he and his athlete wife partook in a little out of hours training, ensuring they didn’t lose their sharpness over the hols.  They went and did sprint practice every day.
 
“We had been given instructions on what to do,” explains Allan. “We found this football pitch, marked out a course and we trained with trainers on. It was just a dirt pitch, the flattest one we could find. Then towards the end of the holiday a woman came walking across the pitch and she pointed at me and said: ‘You’re terrible, you’ve never let that women beat you once.’”

Wells was equally as ruthless that night in Moscow.  He had earlier set a Scottish record of 10.11 seconds in the heats, a record that still stands today, nearly 30 years later.  Drawn in lane 8, he had a clear view of those on his left who may raid him of his chance a glory.  But there was no way that was going to happen.

Wells belted out of the blocks, and as he burst clear of the runners in the middle, it became obvious that his only serious challenger was going to be Cuba’s Silvio Leonard, on his far left in lane 1.  As they crossed the line, it was apparent that Leonard had indeed pushed Wells all the way, making for one of the most dramatic Olympic finals in history.  It was, like Hoy’s win in 2004, a photo finish.  After what seemed like hours, Wells was declared the winner, and Scotland toasted their first Olympic sprint winner since Eric Liddell won the 400m in 1924.

RO
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Last month –  5th place was shared by Eric Liddell and Dick McTaggart – read their stories here.
Next month – the Scottish Olympic Legend countdown continues: No. 3

To read our exclusive interview with Allan Wells, click here.
To read our exclusive interview with Chris Hoy, click here.