He has genuinely been a legend to us younger guys

offer advice and ask what we’d been up to.

“He’s a good loser as well as a good winner, and I hope that I learned that from him.

“It’s very easy to base your selfesteem on how well you ride a bike or on the result you had that day. He taught me not to do that.

“We’d sit at the dinner table and – whether we’d had a good result or a bad one – Chris was always upbeat.

“He’salsoagreatambassadorand figurehead for our sport. Unlike me, he knows the right things to say all the time!

“The way he conducts himself with the media is a stand-out example of how he’s helped me personally.

“He’s a top guy off the track too. After London 2012, he took a group of us out on a motorsport day, where we could charge round a racetrackinalltheseincrediblecars. He didn’t have to do that.

“He likes to think he’s pretty hot behind the wheel – and he certainly smashed me that day!

“I’m sure Chris (right) retired at the right time for him. There comes a point in everyone’s career when the cons outweigh the pros and you are deciding whether to carry on.

“Therewillbepeople, particularly in Scotland, a bit disappointed that he didn’t hang on a couple more years to race in the arena named after him at the Commonwealths.

“But he’ll have thought long and hard about it and it wouldn’t have been an easy decision.”

Clancy has two Olympic gold medals, five World Championships and four Europeans, but missed out in his one Commonwealth Games in Melbourne in 2006.

“At the time I was 21, I’d just started making the senior team pursuit and was