Chris HOY brushed away a tear as he made Olympic history here yesterday. The 32-year-old from Edinburgh became only the fourth Scot to win a second Olympic gold medal when he anchored the cycle team sprint to victory in the Laoshan Velodrome.

With his parents, family and girlfriend looking on, he was moist-eyed on the podium as the national anthem was played and the Union flag was raised. With two more disciplines to ride, in both of which he won the world title last year, it could be a flood of medals and emotion within days.

Hoy already has claims to be the greatest Scottish sportsman in history, with a total of nine world titles and two Olympic titles and a silver.

Yachting provides three double champions - Lorne Currie, Rodney Pattison and Shirley Robertson - and rowing one, Angus Gillan. Pattison also won Olympic silver, and Hoy is now tied with him.

The 32-year-old rider, who won gold in the kilometre sprint in Athens four years ago, only to see the event axed from the Olympic programme, took the team sprint gold with Jamie Staff and Jason Kenny.

They wrote out the world record held by France in their qualifying round, eliminated Germany, who finished with bronze, in the second, and then beat France in the final. The French had relegated Britain to silver at the last three world championships.

"We have been waiting so long for this," said Hoy. "We've been dreaming about it, but when it actually comes to fruition, it's two different things. Tonight just means so much more to me, having the family around."

Hoy had climbed the steep banking of the wooden track and hugged each of them in turn. "There was my mum Carol, father David, my sister Carrie who is six-months pregnant and her fiance, Garry, plus my girlfriend, Sarra - quite a big entourage." His win came as another British protester was thrown out of China. Phil Kirk, from St Albans, Hertfordshire, was detained after he and another protester unfurled a "free Tibet" banner down the headquarters of the state broadcaster.

Hoy is already the only sprinter to have won world gold in all four cycling disciplines: team sprint, keirin, individual sprint and kilometre time trial, making him the world's greatest track sprinter of all time.

The Union flag was by far the most prolific in the velodrome. With regional flags banned by the International Olympic Committee, there was not a Saltire or Lion Rampant in the house.

But was his father not tempted? "It's GB at the Olympics, so it's the GB flag," David Hoy told The Herald. "On Commonwealth Games business it's the Saltire and Lion Rampant. First of all Scotland would have to build three velodromes at £50m a time to match UK facilities. Then there's world-class performance funding (£4m a year). And it takes eight years to get a medal. Multiply that across all sports, and Scotland would be facing a huge sports bill."