OLYMPICS: Cyclist Clancy goes in pursuit of more golds (From Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard)

Tetbury's Team Pursuit golden boy could have two more Olympics in him

7:22pm Tuesday 7th August 2012 in Sport By Danny Hall, Sports Editor

KEVIN CLANCY believes his son, the double gold medal-winning Ed, is good for not one but two more Olympic Games.

Clancy jnr, 27, was part of the Beijing gold medal squad in the Men’s Team Pursuit and defended his title successfully in London, adding a bronze medal in the Men’s Omnium for good measure.

Various members of the Clancy clan, who moved to the village of Doughton just outside Tetbury from Huddersfield ten years ago, enjoyed three days of action in the Velodrome, but Kevin and wife Cathy watched the golden high of Ed’s week at home on TV.

Kevin insisted: “Edward was in the form of his life and his Games panned out exactly as he had predicted to me.

“His main focus was the Team Pursuit as he was a bit of marked man in the Omnium.

“The Omnium can be a lottery and I think any of the riders would have taken bronze at the start of the event – so Edward was happy with that.

“I don’t just expect him to compete at Rio in 2016 but in 2020 as well – he is certainly young enough to go to two more Olympics.”

There is the tantalizing prospect that GB could turn up for the Team Pursuit in Rio with the ultimate dream team.

Tour De France and Olympic road race gold medallist Bradley Wiggins has hinted that he might be tempted by a return to the Team Pursuit, in which he won gold in China alongside Clancy.

And multi world champion Mark Cavendish, who has yet to win an Olympic gold medal, has also indicated that the Team Pursuit could prove his focus in 2016 with the Rio road race course unlike to suit sprinters like himself.

“Mark came through the British Cycling Academy together with Edward, who I know would relish fighting for his place on the team,” said Clancy senior.

“He takes the view that the more top class racers that are challenging for places in the team the better.”

Clancy jnr and his Team Pursuit team-mates Steven Burke, Geraint Thomas and Peter Kennaugh smashed the world record en route to claiming the Olympic title.

And yet Clancy feels the quartet could go even faster in the future, after revealing that Thomas – the other surviving member of the Beijing four – was hit by illness in the run-up to the Games.

“Geraint had a bad case of food poisoning last week,” said Clancy. “He was still good and he still pulled it off, because he is a world-class rider.

“But if he was on his ‘A’ game, we would have gone quicker.”

In his bid for a second gold, Clancy won two of the six disciplines in the Men’s Omnium, finishing second in another, but left himself too much to do with a below-par effort in the distance elements – the Points Race (11th) and the 15km 60-lap Scratch Race (10th).

However, a blistering 1km time trial – in which he came within two tenths of breaking the Olympic record set by Sir Chris Hoy in Athens hauled him from fifth pace into third behind the winner, Denmark’s Lasse Hansen.

“At one point I thought I was on for the gold, but that just slipped away,” said Clancy.

“The kilo, the pursuit, the flying lap - I had a personal best in all of them. It’s just a shame that in the bunch races I got torn apart by the specialists.”

Not surprisingly, the Clancy family have put in a big order for the specially-minted stamps featuring their famous son but, at present, there are no plans to officially paint one of Tetbury’s red post boxes gold to commemorate Ed’s triumph.

“Our nearest post box is the one outside Highgrove,” revealed his dad Kevin.

Perhaps one of their influential neighbours could have a word in high places.