Sir Chris Hoy says Jason Kenny could end up with 12 Olympic golds

Jason Kenny could win another six gold medals according to Sir Chris Hoy, who points out that he only won his first Olympic gold at the age of 28 – the same age Kenny is now.

Hoy told the Bolton News that Kenny could dominate track sprinting for years to come.

"He is only 28 now. I was 28 when I won my first Olympic gold medal and he's got six. In theory he could go on for another two Games and could win the same again at each of those. He has potential to win another six gold medals, which is incredible."

Hoy did however sound a note of caution when pointing to the potential impact of being a household name. He said that while he never missed training from doing commercial work, he did miss some rest periods.

"The media interest and additional demands mean your time is so scarce and in the background your rivals, who have not had this success and don't have this demand on their time, are working to knock you off your perch. That is the biggest risk for athletes, getting the balance right.

"Of course reap the rewards because they have survived on a pretty measly budget for a number of years and they have the chance to commercially capitalise on it now. You have to weigh it up against the downside. The more you do of that the harder it is to recover from your training.”

Hoy also believes that if funding is maintained, Team GB could maintain its dominance on the track.

"Every time the team perform at that level you think 'that was brilliant but we can't expect that next time' and they go out and do it again," he said.

"We can maintain our status as the top nation in track cycling for the foreseeable future, certainly for the next Olympic cycle and for a long time if we keep the investment and keep focusing on the younger riders coming into the programme. If funding is cut that is when you start to have issues."

Both Hoy and Kenny were among those who wrote to Prime Minister Theresa May to ask for greater investment in cycling infrastructure recently. Hoy said that continued Olympic success would hopefully keep cycling in people’s minds.

"There are so many spin-offs: the health benefit to the nation, reducing the strain on the NHS, getting more people into the sport who could potentially win medals.

"To ask for five per cent commitment of the transport budget is really not that much in what it could mean long-term for the country. It is not a fad which is going to fade away whenever we stop winning medals, we are going to keep winning medals and that is going to keep the sport in the forefront of people's minds."