Commonwealth Games year was to prove another successful one for Ian McCafferty. He started the season off by winning the silver medal in the 800m at the District Championships before finishing in the same position in the National 1500m Championships. He then became the first athlete from the club to be selected for the Commonwealth Games, competing in both the 1500m and 5000m in Edinburgh. In the 1500m he finished 3rd in his heat, qualifying for the final with a time of 3mins 44.1secs. In the final he finished in 6th place with a time of 3mins 42.2secs in an elite field which included Kip Keino, Dick Quax and Brendan Foster. The following day he started his quest for the Gold medal in his favoured event, the 5000m, qualifying comfortably from his heat in a time of 14mins 00.6secs. The final, two days later, saw one of the best ever Commonwealth Games races with Ian McCafferty narrowly missing out on the Gold Medal by a mere 6/10th of a second to fellow Scot Ian Stewart with a time of 13mins 23.4secs.  Ian McCafferty became the third fastest man ever in the event. Scant consolation to Ian for narrowly missing the Gold, however he ended the season with the Scottish All-Comers Record in the 2000m (5mins 21.0secs) and 3000m (8mins 02.4secs), the Scottish Native Record in the 2,000m (5mins 21.0secs), 3000m (8mins 02.4secs) and 5000m (13.23.4secs). During the season he also broke the National Records for both the 1500m and 5000m however these were subsequently broken by other Scots.

In the younger age-groups, Jim Thomson took 13.5secs from his 1500m personal best to finish top of the Boys rankings for the first time and also won the District Title in the same event.

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