Big Interview: Still no stopping speed king Sir Chris Hoy

Just like those 10 seconds on a flying lap in the velodrome, there are no mistakes, no stutters, every swift sentence is neatly packaged like a sprint finish.

The Scottish cyclist doesn’t seem like the sort of character content to take it easy, he’s a doer, a climber, someone always striving for the next goal.

So what does a man who has more gold than a 19th century Californian river, who transcended his sport, and became the main catalyst behind the biggest boom in exercise this country has seen for decades do now he’s retired? Well the answer, it seems, is quite a lot.

Whether it’s racing cars, planning polar expeditions, or spreading the gospel about cycling, Hoy is keeping himself busy four years after bowing out of Olympic competition. But as he explains, he hasn’t hung up his bike.

“I’ve never really stopped,” he admitted. “It’s not really training, but I’ve been riding my bike since I retired just because it’s a fun thing to do.

“It’s nice to have a specific goal to work towards and a very different challenge to work towards. It’s nice to have a little target.”

That target, at the moment, is cycling to the South Pole. The snow bike Hoy is training on has huge thick tyres, it’s a completely different beast to the superfast lightweight racing machine he’s used to.

“We went out to Iceland to do some proper snow riding but aside from that it’s just time on the bike, because it’s 10, maybe 12 hours a day riding,” explained Hoy. “It’s just about getting used to being on the bike for that amount of time, in that wide-arm position and sitting upright.

“It’s very different (to what I’m used to), massively at the other end of the spectrum. It’s ten seconds of sprinting versus ten hours of riding. But it should be good.”

But Hoy is a self-confessed speed addict, and he now uses motor racing to get his fix. Last year he took part in the 24 hours of Le Mans race and this summer he competed in the Caterham Seven 310R Championship.

It turned out to be pretty dramatic at times, particularly at Brands Hatch when he was rear-ended at 75mph and span off.

“I love the adrenaline, I love the competition,” said Hoy. “The motorsport stuff reminds me of my cycling in my early days, that feeling of excitement on race days, when you get up and you’re heading down the track and all you want to do is race.

“It’s a huge amount of fun but also being at a stage where you’re learning all the time and improving.

“When I was cycling towards the end of my career I was at this invisible ceiling where you had little scope for improvement. Whereas now you’re so far down the ladder you have these big steps for improvement.

“You spend a week of testing and training and you can see you’re getting quicker and better.

“The (Caterham) cars are very light and basic, you’re on a level playing field, the driving is the most important part. It’s all about the person, which is nice.”

Hoy was the top dog of the velodrome for much of his cycling career, but he’s back in the pack for motor racing. So was it weird being a chaser, rather than a leader?

“Not really because it’s quite nice not to be the favourite,” he said. “You’re still centre of attention in terms that people will still come over and say hello and ask you why you’re doing it, it’s a very friendly environment the motorsport community.

“It’s nice not to have the expectation all the time that you’re going to win every race, but then you push yourself on.

“Particularly when you’re getting on a bit, I’m not a teenager anymore, those days are gone when you pick up a new sport so it’s quite nice to have something new that you can genuinely improve with.”

Despite these remarkable hobbies, interests, and goals – Hoy is making more time for family life.

His wife Sarra gave birth to their daughter Chloe a fortnight ago, and the pair already have a two-year-old son called Callum.

Hoy is now 41, but he waited until he retired from cycling to start a family. But it was Sarra who encouraged him to set himself new goals because he was moping around the house looking miserable.

One of his other interests is spreading the word about cycling.

“I try to, on all levels, encourage people to be more active, and cycling is a great way of doing that,” he said. “Cycling has grown out of all recognition in the last 20 years.

“When I was first racing around, out training on the roads, you would see maybe half a dozen cyclists out on your two-hour ride and that would be it. And you would have known them all.

“Now you go out and there are bikes everywhere! It’s amazing how it’s grown.”

Hoy’s six gold medals at the Olympics lit the touch-paper for the cycling boom, which has taken the UK by storm.

Now, he’s campaigning to make Britain’s roads safer for cyclists, and he’d like to see the government adopt a more European approach to bikes.

“It’s a huge challenge,” he said. “We’re a long way from where we need to be to make the roads safer and to encourage people to take up cycling to make it an attractive thing to do.

“A lot of people are put off because of their fear of safety. In reality it is a very safe activity but there have been a couple of tragic incidents, we need to cut down on those. The best way is to encourage those with the power to make the decisions that puts cycling at the centre of their transport plans.

“To not make it an after-thought, ‘Oh shall we stick a little bike route in here?’, to have specific routes that you can get through cities.

“Segregated bike lanes that make you want to ride your bike. It takes time, in our small island it’s not going to happen overnight.

“A lot of the problems we’ve had is because the growth has happened so quickly, we’ve not had time to adapt to it all.

“But there’s no reason why we can’t eventually be like Denmark, Holland or Germany and have bike paths and cycling at the centre of our transport.”

Fellow sprint cyclist Jason Kenny has already drawn level with him on six gold medals and Hoy knows if it’s not him, then eventually, someone will overtake him.

Which is why his impact on cycling as a whole means more to him than his medals.

“Don’t get me wrong, when I was the most successful Olympian ever in Britain and now the joint-most successful, it’s a cool tag line to have but it will go eventually,” he said. “It’s inevitable, whether it’s from cycling or another sport, it’s going to happen at some point.

“I just feel massively proud to be part of something that’s more than just an individual winning medals.

“At the end of your career it’s great to have these medals as a memory of your career, but to be part of a bigger thing – almost a movement really – that’s so much better.

“Cycling is not a fad, not an overnight thing that’s going to die down, it’s here to stay and it’s only going to get bigger.

“To have been at that moment where it really exploded was incredible.”