OLYMPIC CHAMPION HOY WINS SCOTS AWARD FOR FOURTH YEAR

Chris Hoy has been named Scottish Sportsperson of the Year for the fourth time in five years. The 2004 Athens Olympic kilometre gold medallist received his award, the Emirate Lonsdale Trophy, at the Commonwealth Games Council for Scotland?s Sportsman?s Dinner in association with the Glasgow 2014 Games bid.

Second was swimmer Kirsty Balfour and third gymnast Daniel Keatings.

The award was for performances between July 2006 and June this year. During this time, Hoy became a double world champion at the World track championships in Majorca in March, where he won both the kilometre and keirin titles. He also won a silver medal in the team sprint.

In May, he set a new 500-metre flying start world record of 24.758 seconds in Bolivia.

Hoy told BBC Sport that being nominated for the award was an honour in itself.

He said he was looking forward to the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

?I?m confident that we can bring home more Olympic medals to Scotland than ever before, with a real podium chance in a number of different sports.?

However, Hoy will be unable to defend his Olympic kilo title, since the event has been dropped from the Olympic programme.

He will be concentrating on his other speciality, the Team Sprint, hoping to go one better than Britain?s best Olympic performance, a silver in Sydney 2000. Britain was fifth in Athens.