"CRAIG is the guy I feel for," said Graeme Obree this week. "He's the guy who's missed out. Only someone who's been at the top – as he has been for the last decade – will know how he's feeling at missing out on all the success."
Obree was talking about Craig MacLean, of course, with the Scottish cyclist having missed out on going to Beijing by a fraction of a second. A pre-Olympics trial pitted him against Jason Kenny and Jason Queally, with Kenny, who would go on to be one
of the revelations of the Games, winning gold and silver medals, getting the nod.
MacLean knows it could have been him, though he is more interested in applauding the three gold medals of his friend of 15 years, Chris Hoy. "It's fantastic for him, and he deserves it, because he works so hard," says MacLean. "I'm really pleased for him."
Hoy has often in the past paid tribute to MacLean, whom he has compared to "a climber, forging ahead and making the footholds, so I could follow behind".
MacLean is five years older than Hoy, but they began track cycling together in the early 1990s, and developed, says MacLean, "in tandem". According to Hoy's version, however, MacLean was the pilot. "Craig pushed the boundaries and did the hard work," says Hoy.
"When someone else has forged ahead it's easy to follow, because you see it's do-able. When you're the one taking the first step it's hard. But that's what Craig did, and I followed behind. For years he was really my coach."
MacLean has an alternative take: "Chris was a significant driving force for me as well, because he was constantly nipping at my heels. I think that without each other, pushing each other on, things would have panned out very differently for both of us."
When they emerged, MacLean and Hoy were inseparable. Both blond and with muscular builds, they were constantly mistaken for each other. Beyond that, what they had in common was talent and ambition, and together they faced the same obstacle: the absence of any funding or career opportunities for track cyclists.
Both considered giving up, but there were a couple of turning points. The first was an initiative called "Developing Excellence", a forerunner to the Scottish Institute of Sport, run by Edinburgh University, which Hoy and MacLean were invited to join. "It didn't give you money," says MacLean, "but it did give you access to the university gym, to lectures on sports performance, that kind of thing. At that time there was absolutely nothing else, so it did help."
The second turning point was the advent of lottery funding in 1997. "We were both at a crossroads," says MacLean. "We'd reached a certain level, but we couldn't sustain it without financial assistance. Until then we were effectively paying to be part of the British team – which shows our commitment."
Hoy might have felt he was honouring the debt he owes MacLean when, with the two cyclists jointly elected as flag-bearers for the Scottish team at the 2002 Commonwealth Games, he opted to step down to allow MacLean to carry the flag alone. "That shows what kind of guy he is," says MacLean. "It was a really nice gesture on his part, and something I'll always appreciate."
For MacLean, who is yet to decide whether to retire or continue to the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi, one consolation of missing out is the knowledge that the team's current domination owes much to those few who, almost a decade ago, began to show the younger generation what was possible. And he, of course, is foremost among them.
The full article contains 621 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
