In article ,
Colin Blackburn wrote:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/olym...ng/7534073.stm

That's a good article.

Peter Keen has turned the sport completely around. He came on the scene
when it was amateurish, under-funded, and to be blunt, unless you
happened to live in the area where the national coaches lived and knew
the right people (or even slept with the right people), then you
wouldn't get selected.

Peter was viewed with a lot of suspicion when he first came on the
scene. The British traditional view of "we've always done it this way,
why should we change just because this new person's on the scene and who
is he and where's he come from anyway?"

I remember meeting him for the first time at a inter-regional track
training day somewhere outdoors in the midlands and I could sense other
coaches/officials "backs getting up" and I remember thinking that Peter
was going to be very influential in changing the sport over the coming
years, whether the sport wanted to be changed or not. Good man!

The results we are getting now speak volumes for the foundations he's
put in place, the huge influx of lottery money, the Manchester indoor
velodrome to replace all those outdoor can't-ride-in-the-rain ones or
Calshot's far-too-small-indoor-one, the engagement of Dave Brailsford
and other good people, and the putting in place of a proper "system" to
train and support cycling athletes.

I only wish such a system had been in place when I was racing. 1984 saw
the first-ever women's cycling time trial at the Commonwealth Games plus
road and track races. But the national cycling scene at the time was so
under-funded, and women's racing so under-represented and
under-reported, that although a full men's team were sent to contest
track, road and time trial, only about 4 women in total were sent who
had to be "all-rounders" in all 3 disciplines, rather than specialists.
Result, no medals for the girls. By contrast, this Olympics has seen
gold on the road, silver in the test and doubtless more to come from the
track from the women. It's been a long time coming and it's bloody
well-deserved by the cycling athletes, male and female, and the coaches.

It gives me immense pleasure and huge satisfaction to watch our team
going out and winning in Worlds and Olympics across the cycling
disciplines. Absolutely first-class and spot-on. Brilliant!