A LASTING tribute to legendary coach John MacDonald is set to be unveiled at a ceremony at Pitreavie Athletics Centre on Sunday.

The spectator stand at the track where the late 89-year-old helped hone the talents of Olympians such as daughter Linsey and Ian Mackie will be renamed in his honour.

In August, the Press reported that the memorial was to be afforded to John after Pitreavie Amateur Athletics Club received backing from Fife Council for the idea.

Fife Sports and Leisure Trust, who operate the athletics centre on behalf of the council, and Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath MP Lesley Laird also pledged their support.

John, who was Dunfermline and West Fife Sports Council’s Coach of the Year for 2015, passed away in July last year while on a short family break and united West Fife’s athletics community in grief.

His long association with Pitreavie spanned decades and, in 1980, he mentored Linsey to a 4x400 metres bronze medal – an achievement matched last year in Rio by another Pitreavie athlete, Eilidh Doyle – at the Moscow Olympics.

Linsey was just 16 when she travelled to the Soviet Union after setting a British junior 400m record of 51.16 seconds. Pitreavie’s first-ever Olympian also finished eighth in the final of her individual event before winning 4x400m bronze at the Commonwealth Games two years later.

He also coached sprinter Mackie, who ran for Great Britain at the Olympics in 1996 and 2000, reaching the 100m semi-finals in the former, who said John helped “make my dreams come true”.

A memorial fund was set up to create a permanent reminder and Pitreavie president Paul Allan said at the time there were “a lot of ideas about what we should do in honour of John as he did so much at Pitreavie”.

It’s now been decided the stand will be named after him. Wendy Watson, chief operating officer for Fife Sports and Leisure Trust, had said: “John has a fantastic training legacy, and, over his coaching career, helped to support numerous athletes, including those who made it to world-class level.

“The trust fully supports the request to name the stand after John and is in the process of working with its partner, Fife Council, to facilitate this.”