Six-time Olympic champion Sir Chris Hoy announced his retirement from competitive cycling 11 years ago, admitting: “I know it is the right decision.”

The 37-year-old Scot had been contemplating continuing until the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow but revealed he was quitting the sport at a press conference in Edinburgh on April 18, 2013.

Hoy was Britain’s most decorated Olympian after his haul of two gold medals at London 2012 saw him surpass rower Sir Steve Redgrave’s record of five, although he was overtaken by former team-mate Sir Jason Kenny in 2021.

In explaining his decision, Hoy said: “I think in sport at the highest level you’re dealing in such small margins and you can tell when you’re good but not good enough.

“It was very emotional coming in there (to the press conference) and I was trying not to watch the video montage with the sad music.

“I don’t want it to be a sad moment.

“I want to celebrate it and be happy because I know it is the right decision.

“It’s a decision that I didn’t take lightly and I thought about it very hard.”

As well as six Olympic titles, Hoy’s 13-year career featured 11 world titles and two Commonwealth crowns.

Hoy’s final race was the Olympic Keirin final on August 7, 2012 – on the final day of the London 2012 track programme.

Following retirement, Hoy pursued his passion for motorsport, including competing in the Le Mans 24 Hours, while he has also written children’s books.

In February 2024, the 48-year-old announced he was undergoing treatment for cancer.

Trinidad and Tobago’s ace cyclist Nicholas Paul continued his rich early season form as he wrapped up another double gold medal-winning outing at the just-concluded Pan American Track Cycling Championships in Los Angeles, California.

Paul’s medals were won in his customary events, the men's Keirin and Sprint, and followed his fairly successful outing at the UCI Championships in Hong Kong where he recovered from a two-cycle collision in the Keirin to win the Sprint.

The 23-year-old again expressed gratitude for the continued support as he represents the twin island republic with much gusto.

“It is always an honour to represent my country and the Pan American region. Thank you to everyone for all the love and continued support. The Journey continues and the next stop will be the Nations Cup in Milton, Canada. So, I just want to continue putting in the hard work and let it show in my performances,” Paul said.

In the Keirin, Paul topped Colombia’s Kevin Quintero, while another Trinidad and Tobago cyclist Kwesi Browne copped bronze.

However, it took a photo-finish to separate Paul and another Colombian Cristian Ortega for the Sprint crown. Paul bettered his South American rival in the first ride before edging ahead in the second ride on the line by millimeters to retain his title.

Meanwhile, Akil Campbell was also among the medals, as he won a bronze medal in the men's scratch race.

In other results at the meet, Alexi Ramirez finished eighth in the women's elimination race and in the women's scratch race, while Makaira Wallace and Phoebe Sandy placed 13th and 17th in the women's sprint qualification, respectively.

Scotland’s Katie Archibald added Commonwealth champion to her long list of accolades on this day in 2018.

Archibald, an Olympic, world and European champion in various disciplines, took gold in the women’s individual pursuit in Brisbane, having broken the Games record in a blistering qualifying session.

Her only previous Commonwealth medal was the bronze she won on home soil in the points race in Glasgow four years earlier.

Archibald, then aged 24, said before racing began gold was the only colour she wanted and swiftly delivered, covering the 3,000m distance in three minutes 26.088 seconds to beat Australian Rebecca Wiasak.

She had set the record at 3:24.119 in a qualifying session which saw three riders go under the previous record set by England’s Joanna Rowsell Shand in Glasgow.

“It means a lot, especially in the individual pursuit because it’s not an Olympic event,” said Archibald. “2014 always stands out as a big year for Joanna Rowsell to kind of echo, because she had the title and the Games record.

“You look at the success she carried from that point in her career. I’d be very proud.”

Fired up by his sister’s performance, Archibald’s brother John then added another medal to Scotland’s tally with silver in the men’s 4,000m individual pursuit as England’s Charlie Tanfield clinched gold.

“I watched her heat run and the pressure was on her,” said John Archibald.

“The Commonwealth Games record went and they all went better than her personal best so she had her back against the wall but she pulled out and delivered on the day and that got me going.”

Sir Chris Hoy was crowned world champion for a 10th time on this day in 2010 as he triumphed in the Keirin at the Track Cycling World Championships in Copenhagen.

A crash in the first heat threatened to wreck Hoy’s plans, but he managed to regroup to qualify for the final.

Azizulhasni Awang pushed Olympic champion Hoy all the way before the British rider edged home to claim his second medal of the Championships.

Hoy had already clinched bronze in the team sprint at the Ballerup Super Arena, but crashed out in qualifying for the Keirin.

Josiah Ng Onn Lam had blocked Hoy, who went on to fall and take out another rider, which caused the race to stop.

Ng was later disqualified and after Hoy progressed through to the final, the Scot had to bide his time before he gained the lead during the final lap-and-a-half to taste success in his first major global event since his triple Olympic success in 2008.

“I certainly didn’t enjoy being bumped on my backside at the start of my first race – that was a bit out of order,” Hoy said.

“It made me angry but I had to keep my emotions in check because I didn’t want the red mist to descend.

“It’s even more special to be back here again where I won my first world title in 2002.

“I would never have predicted then that I would be coming back here in eight years time, let alone to win a 10th title. I’m delighted.”

Dame Laura Kenny admitted a lack of hunger to pursue an unprecedented sixth Olympic gold medal contributed to her decision to announce her retirement from cycling at the age of 31.

Kenny, Britain’s most decorated female Olympian, faced an improbable task to reach a fourth Games in Paris this summer having not returned to training after giving birth to her second child.

Realistically, she required an extraordinary performance at next month’s Track Nations Cup in Canada to stand any chance of making the squad, and for Kenny it ultimately came down to a question of priorities.

“Going on to win another gold medal, as much as I would love to do that, it wasn’t giving me the energy I wanted anymore, it just wasn’t,” Kenny told BBC Breakfast.

“I wasn’t thinking, ‘I really want to go on and win one’. I was thinking, ‘I really want to stay at home with the children’.”

Kenny and her husband, Sir Jason Kenny – Britain’s most decorated Olympian – last year welcomed a second son to their family and she said spending time at home was proving increasingly alluring to her.

She added: “I always knew deep down I would know when was the right time. I have had an absolute blast but now is the time for me to hang that bike up.

“It’s been in my head a little while, the sacrifices of leaving the children and your family at home is really quite big and it really is a big decision to make.

“More and more, I was struggling to do that. More people asking me what races was I doing, what training camps was I going on – I didn’t want to go ultimately and that’s what it came down to.

“I knew the minute I was getting those feelings. Once I said to Jase, ‘I don’t think I want to ride a bike anymore’, I started to feel relief.”

Kenny won team pursuit and omnium gold at both the 2012 and 2016 Olympic Games and madison gold at the 2020 Olympics, where she also won a silver medal in the team pursuit.

She is a seven-time world champion and 14-time European champion, won two Commonwealth Games titles and was British National Road Race champion in 2014.

Kenny said the “absolute highlight” of her career was the 2012 Games in London, during which her relationship with Jason also became public.

“I never thought I would go to a home Games, let alone go on to win two gold medals,” she said.

“When I look back, I’m like ‘wow, those two weeks did really change my life’.”

Tributes poured in following Kenny’s announcement, with former Olympic heptathlon champion Dame Jessica Ennis-Hill writing on Instagram: “Laura what an incredible career you have had!

“You are such a legend, always will be and you will continue inspiring! Enjoy this next chapter.”

Sprint great Mark Cavendish described Kenny as an “absolute legend”, while British Olympic Association chairman Sir Hugh Robertson wrote: “Dame Laura Kenny has been our greatest ever female Olympian and a huge part of cycling and Team GB’s success at London, Rio and Tokyo.

“However, as well as being an outstanding athlete, she has also been a wonderful personality. We will all miss her enormously and wish her, and her family, all the very best for the future.”

Kenny, made a Dame in the 2021 New Year’s Honours, hopes to be at this summer’s Paris Olympics “in some capacity” and wants to stay involved with the GB cycling team.

“There’s nothing set in stone but there are things I’m so interested in doing,” she added.

“Something to help the younger generation, whether that could be some kind of academy.

“I could never be a coach because that’s just too much pressure for me, but maybe something in the background that would help the youngsters have the opportunities I had.”

Great Britain team performance director Stephen Park paid tribute to Kenny, saying: “Laura hangs up her wheels as not just one of the sport’s greatest riders, but as one of the greatest sporting talents our country has ever produced.”

Park added: “Just as impressive, however, is the impact which Laura has had on her fellow riders on the GB cycling team and the next generation of Olympic hopefuls.

“She has been a beacon of inspiration for so many, young and old, and I’m sure that the entire British cycling community will join me in wishing her the very best in the next chapter of her life.”

National female track cyclist Dahlia Palmer and national para-cyclist Marloe Rodman are set to compete on the world stage in the coming days, for a chance of qualifying for the Olympic Games in Paris later this year.

Palmer will continue her quest to amass points towards her world ranking in her pet event, the keirin, at the Nations Cup in Hong Kong China this weekend. Dahlia performed exceptionally well at the Pan Am Games in Chile last November, earning the nation’s first ever medal in the keirin event at that level, with a bronze.

Marloe, who is the first para-cyclist to stand a very good chance of qualifying for the Olympic games will be participating in the Para-cycling Track World Championships in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil on March 21, 2024.

Jamaica’s only Olympic medal outside of track and field was won by Cyclist David Weller in the individual time trial event in the 1980 Olympics in Moscow.

Dame Laura Kenny’s retirement from cycling means she will not add to her five Olympic gold medals and ends the record-breaking run she shared with her husband Sir Jason Kenny.

Here, the PA news agency looks at the pair’s achievements on the biggest stage.

Laura Kenny

Kenny won the team pursuit and omnium double at both London 2012 and Rio 2016, under her maiden name Laura Trott, and when she and Katie Archibald won the Madison at Tokyo 2020 she became the first British woman to win gold at three separate Games.

Silver in the team pursuit also meant she won multiple medals at three successive Games, a feat matched by only Charlotte Dujardin among British women – the equestrian star has three gold, a silver and two bronze to her name.

That team pursuit was, remarkably, the first time Kenny had entered an Olympic event and not won gold. A subsequent sixth place in the omnium and the decision not to continue to Paris this summer leaves her final medal count at five golds and one silver.

She ends her career with seven World Championship, 13 European Championship and two Commonwealth Games gold medals, and 42 total medals across those events and the Olympics.

Jason Kenny

If Laura Kenny is Britain’s highest-achieving female Olympian, her husband holds the overall national record.

Jason Kenny won gold in the team sprint at three straight Olympics, from Beijing 2008 through to Rio. He doubled up with the individual sprint in London and made it a treble in Rio with the keirin.

Winning the latter event in Tokyo gave him a British-record seventh gold, taking him ahead of his long-time sprint team-mate Sir Chris Hoy.

Silver in the individual sprint in Beijing and the team event in Tokyo gives him nine Olympic medals in total – one ahead of Sir Bradley Wiggins as the leading Briton, with Hoy on seven.

Jason Kenny won 28 major medals in total, with three additional golds at the World Championships and one at the European Championships.

Dame Laura Kenny has always been able to light up any room she steps into, and never more than when she is in a velodrome.

Bright and bubbly, she became the face of British Cycling’s more than decade-long dominance on the track from the moment Kenny, then Trott, announced her talent to the wider world at London 2012.

The two Olympic gold medals she won barely 20 miles from her childhood home in Cheshunt, Hertfordshire, were the first of five that made her Britain’s most successful female Olympian, and the most successful female Olympic cyclist on the planet.

But on Monday she announced it will be five and out, calling time on her decorated career at the age of 31, ending outside chances she may ride at the Paris Games.

Already in a hurry, Laura Trott was born a month prematurely with a collapsed lung. Diagnosed with asthma, she was advised to take up sport to regulate her breathing.

She started trampolining but switched to cycling after mum Glenda began riding to lose weight. Laura and her sister Emma went along – and both made careers out of it, Emma as a road rider and coach, and Laura as one of the greatest track stars the sport has ever seen.

She started winning races at her local track, Welwyn, aged eight, and got hooked on success. A world junior omnium title earned her a place on Britain’s senior roster and aged only 18 she was part of the team pursuit squad that won European gold.

Having set herself a goal of making the Rio Games in 2016, Kenny was on her way to the London Olympics.

There was an inevitability to winning team pursuit gold – the world record was broken all six times Trott teamed up with Joanna Rowsell and Dani King (nee Rowe). Two days later, Kenny came from behind to claim omnium gold as well.

That made her Britain’s second double champion of the Games after Jason Kenny. A day later the pair were seen kissing as they sat behind David Beckham at the beach volleyball. Cycling had its new golden couple.

After they replicated their London success in Rio – Laura winning two golds and Jason three – they got married close to home in Cheshire.

They say opposites attract, and if Jason is a self-professed “miserable sod”, Laura is the charismatic marketer’s dream with the success to match. “It was just like yin and yang,” Laura said.

Thoughts like this tumble out of Kenny every time she sits down for an interview. She might want to talk about her love of Bruce Springsteen’s music, or how she once saw her grandmother’s ghost, or how she and Jason ended up adopting a family of ducks that came into their garden.

But she is just as open about the challenges she has faced, and recent years have been an emotional rollercoaster.

A year after Rio, Laura gave birth to son Albie. While Jason quietly retired – a decision he reversed before even announcing it – Laura was clear she intended to return in time for Tokyo.

She did so, but perhaps needed the Covid-enforced postponement of the Games to recover from a string of injuries suffered in early 2020. In Tokyo, Britain’s dominance in the velodrome came under increasing threat, and they settled for silver in the team pursuit.

Kenny’s fifth gold came alongside Katie Archibald in the first ever women’s Madison at an Olympics, but she lost her omnium crown after a heavy crash in the scratch race.

That disappointment was nothing compared to the trauma that was to come. In November, Kenny suffered a miscarriage. Then in January she had an ectopic pregnancy and lost a fallopian tube during emergency surgery.

She did not reveal either until she had just won team pursuit silver at the Nations Cup in Glasgow, but in characteristic fashion she spoke openly of the impact – how she questioned her future in the sport but used cycling as a her safety blanket.

She surprised herself with Commonwealth Gold in the summer of 2022 before the healthy arrival of a second son, Monty, in 2023 gave Kenny the sign she needed to know it was time to retire.

Dame Laura Kenny has announced her retirement from cycling.

The 31-year-old leaves the scene as Britain’s most successful female Olympian, and the most successful female cyclist in Olympic history.

She was also the first British woman to win golds at three consecutive Games after her titles at the 2012, 2016 and 2020 Olympics.

Here, the PA news agency looks at Kenny’s five Olympic golds.

Team Pursuit – London 2012

There was something inevitable about Great Britain’s win in the women’s team pursuit. Including pre-Olympic races and the event itself, in the six times Kenny, then Trott, had joined Joanna Rowsell and Dani King (now Rowe) in riding the event, they broke the world record six times. They lowered the bar to three minutes 15.669 seconds in qualifying, shaved off another second in the first round, and then won gold in a time of 3:14.051.

Omnium – London 2012

A day after the team pursuit, Trott was back on track for the first three events of the omnium. She led after day one, having won both the flying lap and elimination race, but was worried 10th place in the points race would cost her. “I messaged my dad halfway through the omnium saying, ‘I can’t do this, I’ve messed this up’,” she later said. “He is always that person that keeps me calm.” Whatever he said in reply, it worked. Although American Sarah Hammer nosed in front after the individual pursuit and doubled her advantage in the scratch race, Trott won the closing time trial to claim gold.

Team Pursuit – Rio 2016

The women’s team pursuit was expanded from three riders per team and three kilometres to four riders and four kilometres in Rio, but there was no change at the top of the standings as Trott and Rowsell Shand teamed up with Katie Archibald and Elinor Barker to retain Britain’s title. And there was a familiar pattern too as they broke the world record in all three rounds, eventually winning in a time of four minutes 10.236 seconds.

Omnium – Rio 2016

After her tense battle with Hammer in London, Trott left absolutely no doubt about who would win omnium gold in Rio. She was either first or second in the opening five events, and so went into the closing points race with a 24-point cushion over her American rival which would never be threatened. “To do what I did in London and to come here and do it again, honestly I cannot believe it,” she said.

Madison – Tokyo 2020

The Tokyo Olympics were a very different affair for Kenny for many different reasons. She gave birth to son Albie a year after Rio, returning to competition in 2018. But she suffered a string of crashes in the run up to the Games, and had they not been postponed for a year amid the pandemic, it is not clear she would have made it. Britain’s dominance was under threat and they had to settle for silver in the team pursuit. But Kenny and team-mate Katie Archibald had done their homework for the first women’s Madison to be staged at an Olympics and bossed the race, winning the first three sprints and then extending their advantage after the Dutch pair of Kirsten Wild and Amy Pieters, reigning world champions, were caught in a crash with 70 laps remaining.

Dame Laura Kenny, Britain’s most successful female Olympic athlete, has announced her cycling retirement.

The 31-year-old has won five Olympic gold medals in her decorated career and had been expected to compete at the Paris Games this summer, but she told the BBC it was time to stop.

Speaking to BBC Breakfast, Kenny said: “I always knew deep down I would know when was the right time. I have had an absolute blast but now is the time for me to hang that bike up.”

Kenny and her husband, Sir Jason Kenny – Britain’s most decorated Olympian – last year welcomed a second son to their family and she said spending time at home was proving more and more alluring to her.

“It’s been in my head a little while, the sacrifices of leaving the children and your family at home is really quite big and it really is a big decision to make,” she added.

“More and more, I was struggling to do that. More people asking me what races was I doing, what training camps was I going on – I didn’t want to go ultimately and that’s what it came down to.

“I knew the minute I was getting those feelings. Once I said to Jase, ‘I don’t think I want to ride a bike anymore’, I started to feel relief.”

Ace Trinidad and Tobago cyclist Nicholas Paul was involved a two-cycle crash in the Mens Keirin semifinals at the UCI Championships in Hong Kong, on Saturday.

Fortunately, Paul, 25, an Elite sprinter and World Record holder, only suffered minor bruises and will rest up for the Men's Sprint competition on Sunday.

“I am good. Just some track burns,” Paul told SportsMax.TV.

Though slightly disappointed by the fall, he remains focused on the task at hand, and is intent on making amends in Sunday's event.

The decorated Paul, whose accolades includes Pan American Games and Commonwealth Games Sprint gold medals, will be joined by his compatriot Kwesi Browne in Sunday’s men’s sprint competition.

Despite Paul’s fall, Browne pushed on to reach the finals of the keirin and had a creditable performance and finished sixth overall.

World and European champion Emma Finucane is hoping to inspire the next generation of young girls after helping to overhaul the fortunes of Great Britain’s women’s sprint squad.

Amid the dominance Britain has enjoyed in Olympic track cycling since Beijing, there had been a glaring weakness since London 2012, with the country failing to even qualify to race in the women’s team sprint at the last two Games as Katy Marchant was left to fly the flag alone in the individual events.

But a plan put in place after Rio to address that has begun bearing fruit since Tokyo, and Britain will head to Paris on the back of team sprint silver medals at both the World Championships in Glasgow last summer and at the European Championships in Apeldoorn in January.

Sophie Capewell, Lauren Bell and Milly Tanner have all earned their place on British Cycling’s Olympic Podium Programme alongside Marchant, and Finucane, 21, made herself the poster girl of the revolution with individual sprint titles at both world and European level in the last seven months.

“Women’s track sprinting has come on loads and I think that’s down to the strength in depth we have,” Finucane told the PA news agency while watching the next set of hopefuls race at the British National Championships in Manchester.

“Even at the nationals we have so many girls breaking personal bests and pushing each other on. We have that internal competition and it really, really helps the women’s sprint. Hopefully in Paris we will have a team sprint and that hasn’t been the case for the last two cycles.

“That is super exciting and I think it shows we can do it, we work just as hard as everyone else and the results will come.

“I hope to inspire younger people to get into sprinting because I didn’t really know a lot about it when I was younger. All you would see was Laura Kenny and the endurance riders, so I think it’s a huge thing for the women’s sprint.”

Finucane surprised herself with her victory in Glasgow last year, a title that thrust her onto the shortlist of favourites for Olympic success in Paris. But only three years ago she was a fresh-faced teenager trying to find her way around the Manchester velodrome after moving from home in Wales.

“I moved up in January of 2021 and I didn’t think Paris was a possibility for me,” she said. “I’m quite young and I’d just moved out of home and only just purely started track sprinting. My career progressed from there and I’m now trying to qualify for the Games so it really is exciting.

“I’ve just tried to take each race as it comes like I always do. I think there has been a part of my career that has happened quite quickly but I wouldn’t have it any other way, just living and riding my bike with these amazing girls around.”

The rainbow jersey has brought added attention and expectation but Finucane’s individual win at the Euros in January, again beating the German duo of Lea Friedrich and Emma Hinze who might expect to be the primary opposition in Paris, suggests she is handling it just fine.

“I’m aware of (the expectations) but I’m just going to try and enjoy the journey, not just focus on the outcome,” she said.

“I feel like that’s where people get lost. It’s a journey and there’s still a long way to go. I’m trying to enjoy the people around me, I still have my circle around me, and I just want to enjoy racing. I feel that’s when I’m at my best.”

Five-time Olympic champion Dame Laura Kenny has only a “slim chance” of competing at the Paris Games this summer, according to British Cycling performance director Stephen Park.

Britain’s most successful female Olympian outlined her ambition to compete at a fourth career Games last November, only a few months after giving birth to her son Monty in July, her second child with husband and seven-time Olympic champion Sir Jason Kenny.

The 31-year-old admitted then it would be a tall order to get back up to speed in time and, as she has not raced competitively since the arrival of Monty, she does not yet have the points required to qualify for Paris, let alone earn selection for a squad that won the world team pursuit title last year.

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With Kenny not in the frame to compete at this month’s Nations Cup in Hong Kong, her final chance to earn those points would come at the final round in Milton, Canada, in April.

“She has a slim chance of being in Paris,” Park said. “The first challenge is for her to be in a position where she feels she is going to be competitive and… put her hand up to be selected for events that would allow her to qualify herself, as well as to qualify in the team.

“Both of those are fairly significant hurdles because you need to get to the right events on the individual level to qualify and secondly she’s got to be competitive in a team that’s more competitive than it’s ever been.”

Kenny is yet to return to regular training at the Manchester velodrome as she follows her own programme and Park said the more likely target for her would be the UCI Track World Championships in Denmark in October.

“We’ve got ongoing and continuing dialogue with Laura and we are supporting her and have been supporting her in terms of her return to training,” he added. “She is still optimistic around the World Championships as the primary event and that was what she has always said she would do.

“The first big piece is her having the confidence she can get to the place. Nobody knows better than Laura what you have to do to win a medal in women’s track and I’ve no doubt if she was going to put her mind to it and felt she was physically and mentally in the right place to make that she would do.”

Kenny won Olympic gold in both the team pursuit and omnium at the London and Rio Olympics. In Tokyo, four years after the birth of her first son Albie, Kenny won a fifth Olympic gold in the Madison alongside Katie Archibald, having also won team pursuit silver.

At last year’s World Championships in Glasgow, Archibald teamed up with Elinor and Meg Barker, Josie Knight and Anna Morris to win gold in the team pursuit and they will head to Paris among the favourites to take the title.

“(Kenny) knows what she needs to do to be competitive and ride at the pace, with the efforts, that she needs to be competitive,” Park said.

“But she’s also conscious as well that she’s getting back into the place and she doesn’t want to be in a situation where she’s affecting the training of the others.

“She’s really conscious of the progress the others are making too and she wants to make sure as and when she’s ready… she is in a place to step into that environment and not hold the others back.”

Sir Jason Kenny announced his retirement from a glittering racing career to move into coaching on this day in 2022.

Great Britain’s greatest Olympian with seven gold medals to his name, Kenny admitted to being “a little bit sad” as he called time on a phase of his life which had made him a household name.

The then 33-year-old, who had won a stunning keirin gold in Tokyo during the previous summer to claim a seventh Olympic title 13 years after his first in Beijing, had been planning to keep going until the Paris Games in 2024.

However, he admitted the opportunity to coach the British squad was one he could not pass up.

Kenny said: “It wasn’t an easy decision. I genuinely wanted to carry on to Paris, but I creak quite a lot these days and I always knew I wanted to go into coaching off the back of it, and this opportunity came along.

“I am a little bit sad, to be honest, because all I’ve known is riding and competing, but I’m quite excited to get stuck into the job.”

Kenny replaced Scott Pollock, who had served as sprint coach in an interim role following the dismissal of Kevin Stewart in November 2020.

He had retired once before, silently stepping away after winning team sprint, individual sprint and keirin gold at the 2016 Rio Games, without announcing his decision until he reversed it a year later.

Kenny said: “Last time, I didn’t realise it, but I was just cooked. I’d never really taken a break [in 10 years], so I just stepped away. Because I never planned on coming back, I completely switched off and got that re-fresh.

“In Rio, I was quite happy to see the back of it. But then since coming back and being refreshed, it’s a lot harder to walk away.”

Kenny was knighted in the 2022 New Year Honours List, while his wife and fellow cyclist Laura – formerly Trott – received a damehood after establishing herself as Britain’s most decorated female Olympian with five golds.