“Flat white please,” say Emma Finucane and Sophie Capewell in unison. It’s a well-rehearsed coffee order, one that GB’s track sprinting duo have made a hobby of placing around the world. They’ve asked for it at competitions in Switzerland and Egypt, Australia and Hong Kong. Today, though, they’re a stone’s throw from home. It’s late February, the morning after the National Track Championships, and we’re in Manchester, sitting in a cafe in the trendy Ancoats district, north of the city centre. The sign on the door reads ‘Off The Press’ – Finucane has chosen an apt spot for a magazine interview, notes accompanying press officer, British Cycling’s Ellie Stott.
We remove our jackets and assemble at a round, wooden table. “I never used to be a flat white girl,” says Finucane, the Welsh-born world and European sprint champion. “I used to be a cappuccino girl.” Capewell’s a bit of a coffee connoisseur, she explains, and has her own machine at home. “I can do a tulip,” she says proudly, when I ask about her latte art repertoire, “but that’s as much as
