Hoy in the form of his life as he chases golden treble

ON MONDAY Chris Hoy leaves for his third Olympics, though, already, Beijing 2008 seems about as far removed from Sydney 2000, or even Athens 2004, as the World Cup final does to a street kick-about.

Nine days ago, a British Cycling media day at the team's training base in Newport, Wales, was abuzz; there was standing room only as Hoy and Victoria Pendleton, poster boy and girl of the British team, were wheeled out to model kit emblazoned with the logo of the sport's new multi-million pound sponsor, Sky TV.

Prior to Sydney, Hoy recalls the departure as "very low key." There was no organised media event. And having flown economy (it will be business class to Beijing), the team spent ten weeks in Australia, in Brisbane and Melbourne, before travelling to Sydney, with the only incident of note a doping case involving a member of the team, Neil Campbell. If that happened now, it would be catastrophic. Back then, with public interest in the British cycling team low to non-existent, it provoked barely a ripple.

Prior to Athens, too, it was all very homely, at least in contrast to the five-star Celtic Manor resort, which has been the team's base for their final training camp, with the Newport velodrome nearby. And for Hoy another change is the identity of his room-mate. With Craig MacLean missing an Olympics for the first time since Atlanta, Hoy has been sharing with the other Scot in the team, Ross Edgar. "Ross is smaller than Craig," notes Hoy, "so he takes up less space."

Though sorry MacLean didn't make it, he adds: "Craig is a chronic insomniac; he'd sometimes wake you up with the miner's light he wore on his head when he fancied reading. There are fewer interruptions with Ross."

From this – and his excitement at owning a new "hand-pump espresso machine" – you will deduce that Hoy was in chirpy, upbeat form as he spoke on Thursday evening. The truth, though, is that this has very little to do with more compact room-mates, uninterrupted nights' sleep, or even the double espressos he will be able to enjoy in the comfort of his room in the athletes' village. Rather, it has everything to do with the form he is in.

A week before his race in Athens, Hoy's father, David, visited his boy and was instantly reassured. "He looked like a racehorse," says David. "I'd never seen him look so healthy, or relaxed. I thought: 'You're flying.'"

He was right. Hoy flew to a sea level world record, and a gold medal, in the kilometre time trial. Four years on, though, Hoy seems to have climbed to a new plateau. The news that he is in better shape than a racehorse should terrify his opponents.

Having won two golds and one silver medal at the world championships in Manchester in March, it seems that Hoy has stepped up again, finding yet another gear to ascend to that next plateau. This possibility seemed on the cards when we met in mid-June at the Manchester Velodrome, and Hoy positively bounded out the weights room, having just squat-lifted a new personal best.

But what would that mean, I asked? How does the ability to lift big weights translate into your performance on the bike? "It's one component," said Hoy, ever the scientist. "And my aim before Beijing is to do personal bests in each component."

This, he confirms, has now been achieved. In one session this week he managed six personal bests, including over 100m and 200m. He initially reveals his new best for 200m, then thinks better of it, fearing that knowledge might be power for his rivals.

"Just say I did two-sub tens," he says, but that is enough. A sub-ten second 200m is equivalent to sub-9.8 for the 100m in athletics: only a very few have ever done it. Dutchman Theo Bos holds the world record of 9.772 seconds, set on the super-fast track in Moscow. Mickael Bourgain, another of Hoy's opponents in Beijing, recently broke the French record with 9.8. But until this week Hoy had never dipped below ten seconds – then he did it twice in a single session. "I was pleased," he says, "but it didn't feel particularly special; it just felt normal.

"It's a sign that it's all falling into place," he continues. "Everything's flowing nicely, I'm not chasing my form; training sessions just happen. And your confidence grows as you train better and rest more. At the moment I'm happy that I'll be going to Beijing in the form of my life. I can't do anything about the other guys, only myself – and from that point I'm in a nice position.

"The whole team is flying. It's frightening how fast the team pursuit guys are going. That's one reason why I didn't get too excited about the sub-ten 200s. We're all producing performances like that, but no one's getting carried away. Everyone's very relaxed.

"It's the way it's been with the team for a long time now. We know we're part of a successful team and that public and media expectations are quite high. But they're high for a reason. It's because we've done well."

What is certain is that Team GB has usurped Australia as the world's dominant nation on the track, which they were in Athens four years ago. At last year's world championships in Palma their coach, Martin Barras, commented that his team had received "a righteous kick up the arse" from the British, who returned home with seven gold medals. On Britain's supremacy in Manchester this year, where they won nine, he remarked: "It's like the house is on fire, and we're just trying to save the furniture."

Not that this has quelled the fighting talk. The Australian rider Brett Lancaster upped the ante this week with a cricketing analogy. "I know a lot of people are talking about the Poms, and they've certainly put some runs on the board," he told The Australian newspaper. "But remember: nothing's better for an Aussie than beating the Poms."

A more serious story that made the news this week was a BBC investigation into the presence of the keirin in the Olympics. The discipline, which has its origins in Japan, was added to the programme in 2000 after lobbying by the Japanese Keirin Association (JKA). The BBC alleged that as well as lobbying there was a £3m payment, the suggestion being that this was effectively a bribe. Hein Verbruggen, former president of the International Cycling Union (UCI) and now one of the most powerful men in the Olympic movement – he chairs the Beijing coordination committee – is the man at whom the muck has been thrown.

Hoy has won the last two keirin world titles and goes to Beijing as favourite, so he will be the last person to speak out against its inclusion. "I don't know the full story," he says, "but it wouldn't be a surprise if the Japanese had put money into developing the event internationally. That makes sense from their point of view. How that money is spent is more the question. I think it'd be very hard to prove that it has lined someone's pocket. The other question is, does it deserve to be there? And I don't think there's any doubt about that: it's there on merit, because it's exciting and it showcases the sport well."

As well as the keirin and sprint, Hoy lines up in the team sprint with… well, with who exactly? Though Jamie Staff was the lead-out man, Edgar number two, and Hoy the anchor in the event at the world championships, Hoy suggests that there could be changes. The presence of 20-year old Jason Kenny, tipped by Hoy to "surprise people" in Beijing, adds another possibility.

"We're taking a slightly different approach," says Hoy. "There's something we've got to try which we can't until everyone is going really well." The experiment was to be held yesterday, though Hoy remains tight-lipped on the details. All he will say is that "I think it'll take a special ride to beat us. We're very confident we'll do the best time a British team has ever done."

Prior to Athens, as well as resembling a racehorse, Hoy was visited by the team's coach, Shane Sutton. "Three days before the kilo, I went to his room," says Sutton, "and said: 'What can I do to make a difference to your performance?' And he said: 'I want you to get me one of the paralympic team's skinsuits.'

"They were wearing different suits," Sutton explains, "and he felt it was a better fit. That said it all to me. I asked all the guys the same question – 'What can I do to make a difference?' – some said apple juice, other quirky things. But Chris was different: he wanted something to do with performance, nothing else. That said it all to me."

Does the espresso machine fall into this category? Who cares: it is, claims Hoy, "what I'm most excited about."

Warming like a mug of coffee to his theme, he explains: "It's the size of a bike pump and doesn't use electricity; you pump it and hey presto, instant espresso. Everyone's taking the mickey now. But we'll see who's laughing when they realise the coffee in the athletes' village is terrible and I'm enjoying my double espresso."

• Heroes, Villains & Velodromes: Chris Hoy and Britain's Track Cycling Revolution (HarperCollins), £15.99