Sir Chris Hoy has spoken about the moment his wife Sarra told him she had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.
Cycling legend Hoy revealed last week that he was terminally ill with cancer and had been told he may have only two to four years to live.
The 48-year-old cycling legend, a six-time Olympic gold medalist for Team GB, admitted in an interview with The times that he knew his cancer was terminal for more than 12 months before he shared the news publicly.
Excerpts from Hoy’s autobiography, ‘All That Matters’, have since been published by the same newspaper.
In his upcoming book, Hoy describes the moment he learned he had cancer and recalled learning Sarra had MS.
Sir Chris Hoy and his wife Sarra pictured at the 2016 Laureus World Sports Awards in Berlin
Sarra has been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, while her husband, 46, has terminal cancer
Cycling icon Hoy, pictured in August 2023, thinks he has ‘two to four years’ left to live
Of his own first cancer diagnosis, he wrote: “The doctor turns the screen towards me to reveal the scan in all its grainy detail, as well as the tumor currently in my shoulder. I don’t want to look at it, as if looking at it will make it even more real and horrifying than it already is. I turn around, not quite ready to accept this news. How can I? It is beyond comprehension.
“Hearing the word ‘cancer’ has had an immediate and profound effect on me, and not just me. Next to the doctor, the nurse’s eyes fill with tears. One moment after the next is a blur and then, before I know it, I’m up and out of the chair, the appointment over. In one brief moment, life has changed irrevocably.
“All I can see in these early moments is this devastating diagnosis, its finality. But Sarra is more optimistic. She hangs on to the words “years and years” and keeps repeating them to me. Gradually I can see better that there is more of a future than I thought.
‘Sarra is the center of my life and has been that way ever since we met, all those years ago. Within minutes of talking to her that first evening, on a night out in Edinburgh in 2006, I knew straight away that she was everything I was looking for.”
Hoy’s cancer was discovered after a visit to the doctor last September when the Scot felt a strain in his shoulder
Sir Chris describes his wife as ‘the center of my life and has been from the moment we met’
Hoy photographed himself in Paris in July this year, where he attended the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games
Regarding his wife’s medical situation, Hoy added, “Sarra’s unwavering love and support for me over the past year are all the more remarkable given what she has also been through. It started last summer with a tingling in her face and tongue, shortly before my own diagnosis. This led to an appointment with the doctor. They weren’t concerned, but referred Sarra for an MRI, as per protocol. The symptoms disappeared long before the appointment date arrived, which happened to be just seven days after my own dreaded news.
So while she was numb with shock, she went to the scan and said it would be a chance for her to lie down for an hour, joking that it was as close to a spa day as she could get . Afterwards, she continued to be completely and utterly supportive, pushing all thoughts of her MRI scan away as her symptoms were long gone.
‘One evening in December, after our children Callum and Chloe had gone to bed, Sarra looked serious and said she had something to tell me. I immediately realized it was something big as Sarra, always so strong in every situation, started to break down and struggled to get the words out. “Do you remember that scan I went for?” she began with teary eyes. “Well, they think it could be multiple sclerosis.” I immediately broke down, distraught by the news and the fact that she had received it without me there.
She went on to explain that they had called and told her over a month earlier. It was so hard to try to figure out that she had absorbed the awfulness of this diagnosis on her own, without sharing it with me, to protect me. I tried to let the words sink in as my thoughts swirled, trying to understand what had happened to her as she had accompanied me to all my own hospital appointments.
‘Just like with my diagnosis, she was the one who brought me back to the present, tried to reassure me and said, “Look at me, I’m fine now, I’m here, I’m fine.”
Hoy and his wife Sarra – who have been married since 2010 – pictured in Berlin in February 2020
Sarra and Sir Chris are the proud parents of two children: son Callum and daughter Chloe
Sir Chris Hoy, pictured in 2012 after winning two gold medals at the London Olympics
