Sir Chris Hoy and his wife Sarra say their thoughts immediately went to their children after they were given devastating diagnoses by doctors just weeks apart from each other.
Six-time Olympic champion Hoy, one of Britain’s most successful ever athletes, was first informed he had prostate cancer in September 2023 and revealed last month that his condition was terminal.
Tragically, Hoy’s partner Sarra – whom he married in 2010 – was herself diagnosed with a ‘very active and aggressive’ form of multiple sclerosis shortly after the track cycling legend was told of his stage-four cancer.
Despite the family going an unthinkably tough time, both Chris and Sarra are intent on remaining positive, with the former determined to live beyond the diagnosis of ‘two to four years’ he was given last year.
Speaking on ITV’s This Morning programme, the Hoys, who recently spent some time away cycling in the Greek mountains, opened up on their experience and the ‘progress’ they had made over the last 12 months.
‘We got the diagnosis and I felt sick, I felt nauseous and the room felt like it was spinning,’ Sir Chris Hoy said, recalling the day his he was given his devastating news.
‘I had to get up, I couldn’t sit still. You can’t ever prepare yourself for that sort of thing, you never imagine yourself in that situation.
‘A million thoughts are running through your head, the first one being, “How on earth are we going to tell the kids?”, all these things.’
Hoy, Scotland’s most decorated Olympian of all time, highlighted how the couple’s young children Callum, 10, and Chloe, 7, remained their number one priority and ‘purpose’.
‘It’s about dealing with the here and now. It wasn’t as if we flicked a switch and suddenly found hope overnight and found this positivity. It’s a seed that grows slowly, it’s something that takes time,’ he added.
‘It’s only when you look back that you realise how much progress you’ve made.
‘I feel it’s having targets each day, it’s having things you have to focus on. The kids are at the centre of your lives so that’s your purpose: to get on, to look after them and make sure they’re okay.
‘But it’s about going back to the here and now. The future doesn’t exist yet and we all worry about so much stuff, small stuff, stupid stuff… 90 per cent of it doesn’t even happen so why worry about it?
‘All we have is right here, right now, so it’s about trying to be present and appreciate the now.’
After receiving their diagnoses, the couple made a conscious decision to ‘stop’ and ‘take stock’ of the situation before breaking the news to their children in a ‘really considered manner’.
‘It was such a huge thing that we knew we had to tell them but, again, it was just trying to stop, take stock and go, “Okay, where are we right now?”,’ Sarra explained.
‘Obviously, we were in panic and realising, “We don’t need to give that to the children”.
‘I think we had some time and tried to do it in a really considered manner. By the time we took that breath and just said, “Stop, hold”, we wanted to protect them, that was our main priority.
‘I think we did manage to do that and be really honest with them but at the same time, not give them information that they needed to carry yet because actually we are looking – not at the time – but as time as gone, we’ve developed this sense of hope and looking to the future.
‘And actually, we are giving that to our children as well that there is nothing to be feared of other just keep going, look to the future and that then, in turn, lifts us so it’s a cycle.’
Hoy called time on his career in competitive cycling in 2013 and has since worked as a regular pundit and commentator for the BBC.
After returning from the Beijing Games with three gold medals in 2008, the Edinburgh-born star was knighted in the New Year Honours List.
That same year, Hoy was named the BBC Sports Personality of the Year, seeing off competition from the likes of Lewis Hamilton and Rebecca Adlington to scoop the prestigious prize.
.
.