Imagine training hard, up at stupid o'clock every morning, running, doing weights after work, undergoing massage and ice baths, watching your nutrition with every meal I take, and having little or no social life for four years, and making it to the Olympics to represent your country in a sport you love, then busting a gut to win, only to come somewhere down the order. Imagine knowing that the training you're doing now will give you arthritis or tendonitis in ten years. Vacuous?

Two members of my family have represented this country in their chosen sports - my sister being in the world championship gold team.

Be dismissive of the hype that goes with the Olympics by all means, but top level sport and sportsmen - especially in the less glamourous or lucrative sports - deserve more respect than that.