14/10/2025
Tom Mackie the founder member of CCC has sadly passed away. Sam Crymble our honorary club member (now located in Ireland) has written a special tribute to Tom as per the following:
Tom was an active rider with Musselburgh Road club before he moved to Aviemore in the early ‘70,s to start up a pottery business at Inverdruie. I remember him riding in his Musselburgh woollen jersey on Club runs.
He was an enthusiastic follower of cycling history and I remember him telling me that his hero was Fausto Coppi who was a Tour de France winner pre-war. I remember that he often wore a Moltini jersey which of course was the team of Eddy Merckx. He confessed that he couldn’t get a Coppi jersey and had to “make do” with a Merckx one!
Tom, as the founder of the Cairngorm CC was the brains behind the design of the Club jersey. The original colours of Orange and Kingfisher Blue was inspired by the colours of the evening sky observed if one was descending from Cairngorm Mountains late evening. I have observed these colours on many occasion and can only marvel at how accurately they were represented in the colours of the original jersey.
The Club in those days had a strong racing focus and we were fortunate in having stalwarts like Tom and George Edwards with their racing pedigree to mentor the rest of us. Club rides were often frantic affairs with a chain band operating and sprints for the 30’s. The last few miles was always an all out race with no mercy given or expected! However weaker riders would often feel Tom’s hand in their back giving them a wee bit of help to stay on the wheels.
Time trials were a regular feature of Club life. I remember that Tom was particularly keen on 2-up events and always seemed to manage to be teamed up with Ewan MacKenzie who was one of the top riders in the North at that time.
Tom was heavily involved with organising local races. The Cairngorms Racing Weekend became a really popular event with attracted large fields from North clubs. This morphed into the Tour of Speyside, organised by Colin Horn which became one of the top stage races in Scotland. This in turn morphed into the current racing weekend.
As a potter Tom designed a range of superb trophies for the Tour of Speyside and for the Kincraig Loop time trial. This event was originally called the George Edward’s and after 10 years was renamed the Makie Trophy race. Tom was always a bit embarrassed by this and had to be coaxed to come along and present the trophy at the first running of the event.
Writing this random things came to mind:
- freewheeling competitions. One popular one was on the back road towards Kingussie approaching Ruthven Barracks. Tom was a regular winner of these. We used to joke that it was his “sturdy constitution “ that helped him win but he insisted that it was his Campagnolo hubs which were the secret. He used to say that Campag wears in while Shimano wears out!
- over the years we have had quite a few noted riders join us on Club runs. One of these was Ian Steel whose daughter worked at Glenmore Lodge at the time. Ian had won the Tour of Britain and followed that up with winning the Peace Race which was the top race on the Continent at that time. Ian was a class rider but at the time he rode with us was well into veteran status and found the pace on Club rides a wee bit hot. Tom confessed to me that he had, for a short time, helped Ian at the wee climb at Lynwilg by giving his a wee push up the hill. He was highly embarrassed and hoped that Ian wasn’t offended.
- my son Keith remembers that as a 14 year-old on his first race, the Kicraig Loop, he was caught by Tom after Feshie Bridge. Rather that tearing past Tom took the time to ride along with him, giving encouragement and a wee push on the back.
I met up for a brew with Tom last July in Aviemore and talked about old times and some of the characters we knew from those early days in Cairngorms CC.
My overall memories of Tom are of a humble genuine man generous with his time and his encouragement to younger or less able riders.
A pleasure to have shared those miles with him.
