Teenager inspired by Hoy is on track to emulate his hero’s golden career path

WITH his lilting Highland accent, and compact, stocky build, John Paul bears a striking resemblance to Craig MacLean, the now-retired, much-decorated track cyclist.

But it was Scotland’s other celebrated sprinter, Sir Chris Hoy, who originally inspired Paul, the recently-crowned junior world sprint champion.

It was watching Hoy’s Olympic gold medal-winning ride in Athens that prompted Paul to tell his father: “I want to do that.”

And yet, in a neat piece of symmetry, Hoy recently admitted that Paul could be supplying inspiration – and maybe competition – to the quadruple Olympic gold medallist over the next couple of years.

After the London Olympics, Hoy will decide whether to carry on for another two years and compete at the Glasgow Commonwealth Games. But he won’t go to Glasgow for a lap of honour. It would be to win at least one gold medal. And the emergence of Paul has encouraged Hoy to believe that, in the team sprint, with Ross Edgar still competing and Callum Skinner emerging, Scotland could start as favourites. That could be a factor, Hoy says, in determining his plans.

Before then, Paul will bid to emulate Hoy next Saturday in Glasgow. Along with swimmer Hannah Miley and badminton player Imogen Bankier, Paul is on the shortlist for the Lonsdale Trophy, awarded by Commonwealth Games Scotland to the country’s sportsperson of the year. The Lonsdale Trophy has been presented eight times – five times to Hoy. And, while this year could be too soon for Paul, at 18, he should have a few more shots.

There is an element of chance to Paul’s emergence as a track cyclist. But the key moment was not chancing upon Hoy’s ride in Athens. It was earlier that year, when his father’s job took the family from Lybster, in the north-eastern tip of Scotland, to Oxfordshire.

Paul was eleven. He explains: “In Lybster I did everything: athletics, football, rugby, gymnastics, badminton. But, when I watched the Olympics that summer and saw Chris Hoy win the kilo, I thought it was the coolest thing ever. I’d never seen track cycling before but I was really intrigued, with the banking and the speed, and I got on to my dad and said, ‘I really want to do this.’ A town near us had a road [cycling] club and they pointed us in the direction of Reading, where they had a track. It was long and didn’t have much banking – I was expecting it to be a nice velodrome like Athens. But they had a great kids’ club and the coaches helped me start. I took to it like a duck to water.”

Such an easy introduction to the sport wouldn’t have been possible in Lybster, of course. His nearest wooden-banked velodrome from there was Edinburgh, 244 miles away. The closest indoor facility was 461 miles away in Manchester. Though Paul is a proud Highlander – and his accent remains as pronounced as the day he left – he admits that, had he still lived there, he probably wouldn’t be junior world champion.

And European champion, since, in Hoy-esque fashion, Paul won gold medals in both the sprint and keirin at the championships in Portugal, which preceded the world championships in Moscow.

In Moscow, he wobbled in qualifying. “I was really nervous,” he says. “I tensed up badly and only qualified fifth, which was a bit disappointing. I wanted to break the junior world record.” The German Max Neiderlag did but Paul faced him in the semi-final and knocked him out in three heats. In the final he faced Frenchman Julien Palma, who’d knocked him out in the first round in 2010. He beat him decisively.

Much is justifiably made of MacLean and Hoy’s roles as trailblazers and pioneers but in Moscow Paul achieved something that neither managed – a junior world title. Last week, to no great surprise, he was confirmed as a member of the British Cycling Academy – also known as the Gold Medal Factory. There seems no reason at all why Paul can’t be the next to roll off the production line.

“I see Chris Hoy training and it’s very motivating – it’s like playing football with Wayne Rooney,” he says. “A lot of people say I’m like a mini Craig, which I take as a massive compliment. These guys are my idols. I want to be like them.”