This weekend, Skins served a demand on the governing body of world cycling seeking damages of $2 million (£1.25million/€1.5 million) as a consequence of alleged mis-management in the Lance Armstrong doping scandal.

For more than five years, Skins has been a proud supporter of world cycling and has partnered with teams, riders and international cycling organisations across the world. As a company we have invested heavily into research and development to build a sports-specific product range aimed at those who participate at every level.

We did all this while under the impression that cycling had been fundamentally reformed after the Festina affair in the 1990's and that coordinated management from the International Cycling Union (UCI) to contain doping activity had minimised the risks and scandals with which the brand of any sponsor would be associated.

The events of the last several months or so have made it abundantly clear that world cycling has not been the sport the general public and the corporate partners thought it was.

Consequently, as chairman of a company that has made a significant financial and emotional investment, I am acting in order to send a message to the UCI and its senior office bearers that gross mis-management and betrayal of trust is completely unacceptable.

The doping scandal involving Lance Armstrong proves that cycling continues to have a major problem

The recent report from the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) which blew the lid off Lance Armstrong's systematic control of widespread doping, proved that the UCI and its two leading figures, President Pat McQuaid and Honorary President For Life, Hein Verbruggen, have failed to eradicate cheating within the sport.

In fact, Mr. McQuaid and Mr. Verbruggen refused to even acknowledge that the problem was so entrenched until USADA forced them into submission. In short, we say that the UCI, Mr. McQuaid and Mr. Verbruggen have failed us, the sport and the public who love cycling.

We also believe the USADA revelations of widespread doping activity have raised wider, cultural issues within the UCI relating to an apparent inability to rid the sport of doping over an extended period of time.

Consequently, it is now clear that Skins' financial and emotional investment into cycling has been damaged and our legitimate commercial expectations have been betrayed. If the public no longer have confidence that cycling is "clean" they may question those who support its existence.

The UCI's decision to uphold the USADA report and strip Lance Armstrong of his seven Tour de France titles, was proof of their acceptance that he cheated in order to be successful.


As a sponsor and commercial partner in the sport, and as a company that produces high performance sports compression wear off the back of cycling's supposedly clean, vibrant and healthy image, our trust in those at the top has been crushed. Our credibility as a company that promotes true competition, fitness and overall health and wellbeing has been affected by our own promotion of its "virtues".

In addition to sending out a message about our commercial position, it is important that organisations such as ours also look to the future and in taking this course of action I'm also advocating a path towards redemption. Let's not just bleat about the core problem, let's consider the wider solution.

The UCI has announced that it will invite an independent commission to investigate cycling's obvious problems but the fact that it took another organisation's report to force them into action (and greatly delayed action) is a disgraceful reflection of incompetence at best.

It fills me with absolutely no confidence that the UCI is either capable of leading global rehabilitation or commissioning a suitably independent and unrestricted group to conduct the forensic enquiry the sport crucially requires. Those at the top have presided over the mess, so how can they possibly be given the responsibility of commissioning and overseeing its review?

Skins' demand against the UCI sends out a serious corporate message that the support of partners and sponsors in any world sport cannot be abused and must be preserved by unimpeachable leadership.

The unequivocal overhaul of cycling can only be achieved by a credible and capable governing body. In serving this action, Skins' is also serving notice that the UCI is not currently the organisation that cycling needs it to be. For the last 22 years, there have been two people at the head of this organisation and we allege that they are directly responsible for the culture of denial within the UCI.

It's past time for change.

Jamie Fuller is the chairman of Skins. To follow him on Twitter click here.

Even with the 2014 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games now less than 500 days away, Sochi is not an easy city to get to.

Most routes will take you via the Russian capital and Moscow Domodedovo Airport, the busiest airport in the vast country.

Despite being a bit claustrophobic, it is best staying inside because the sub-zero temperatures outside are truly painful.

But this is what I expected from Russia, and paying close attention to the stereotype I wrapped up warm for my visit.

My clothing proved most suitable for Moscow, but following a two and a half hour flight, I arrived in Sochi rather perplexed.

Rather than a snow covered city you would associate with a Winter Games host city, Sochi was simply glistening in the sun as I climbed off the plane.

I was fully aware that it wasn't the coldest city in the world, but I admit I was a little taken aback to find a humid subtropical climate with palm trees out in force.

Sochi often has a humid subtropical climate

Located on the shores of the Black Sea, Sochi presents something a little different to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) when it comes to a Winter Games.

It was back in July 2007 that Sochi was announced as the host city of the 2014 Winter Games, edging out Pyeongchang in South Korea and Salzburg in Austria with a little help from a certain Vladimir Putin at the IOC Session in Guatemala City where it claimed victory.

Work began under Organising Committee President and chief executive Dmitry Chernyshenko; with the Russian Government quick to support him with around $12 billion (£7 billion/€9 billion) of funding they are likely to see a return on.

Vladimir Putin played a key role in helping Sochi secure the 2014 Winter Games at the 119th IOC Session in Guatemala City

The venues were first, and they are already an impressive site, but it is the Sochi Light Metro that is perhaps most impressive.

On my hour car drive from the airport to Sochi city centre, I travelled almost parallel with the train track that is still under construction and crucial to the success of the Games.

With the cost of the rail estimated at $760 million (£474 million/€589 million), it is certainly not cheap but it will connect the whole of the Sochi 2014 Olympic and Paralympic Games while dramatically decreasing travel time from the airport.

Upon arriving at my hotel for the 2012 Peace and Sport International Forum, I found myself surrounded by stunning, rolling hills, but still no snow.

It wasn't as if it needed snow to look picturesque, but as a non-winter sport expert, I assumed it was a prerequisite.

The Sochi Light Metro is almost complete ahead of the 2014 Winter Olympic and Paralympics

It didn't take an age for me to be informed that in February and March, when the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics and Paralympics will take place, snow falls in abundance.

And it was not long before I ran into Swiss IOC Executive Board member René Fasel, the International Ice-Hockey Federation (IIHF) President and Sochi 2014 Coordination Commission member.

He wasn't a bad person to explain the situation in a little more depth.

"I'm really amazed what the Russian people have done with this place," he told me.

"I was here in 2005 when they decided to launch a bid.

"They asked me if it was possible back then and I said it was with a lot of hard work.

"Now, seven years later, when you see what they have done, it is unbelievable.

"They are really putting so much investment and effort into making this a winter sport city and having seen many Winter Games, I know this one will be special.

"They are doing all the right things that need to be done to ensure the best possible conditions for athletes."

IOC Executive Board member René Fasel is impressed with the Sochi 2014 preparations

A short while later, it was the IOC's vice-president Thomas Bach who was ready to give Sochi 2014 the seal of approval.

"These are excellent preparations and I think we can really look forward to a great a Winter Games in Sochi," he told me.

"I was here for the first time in 1995 and to see how the city developed is a miracle.

"But to see it again now, 12 months after my last visit, it is like another miracle.

"So I'm really, really confident in these Winter Games."

It is high profile endorsement from two senior figures and it felt a little bit in contrast with what Vitaly Mutko, the Minister of Sport for Russia, said in his opening press conference.

"We do have concerns and we do have challenges," he said, highlighting the fact that construction isn't yet finished.

"So we cannot yet be confident and only through the joint effort of all the Games partners can we fill all the gaps we have."

Minister of Sport for Russia Vitaly Mutko (C) is keen to play down Sochi 2014 expectations in the media

Shortly after that press conference, Mutko was in the hotel lobby laughing with IOC members and not looking all that concerned.

Perhaps it was all a clever tactic – don't build expectation in the media and then stun the world with a magnificent event.

It may very work because while Sochi 2014 is not exactly a "Winter Wonderland" right now, it is looking like a very good host city for the Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Tom Degun is a reporter for insidethegames

If I shut my eyes – although I want to make it clear that I don't have to do this to think, in the same way that I am capable of walking and chewing gum at the same time – and recall the Olympic Games I have been fortunate enough to experience at first hand...well, I'll do it now. Don't think I'll actually bother with the eye shutting however. That was more of a rhetorical flourish.

1992...Barcelona...walking back down the dusty pathways of Montjuïc hill amid a tide of spectators at the end of another night's athletics at the stadium, the air still packed with heat, the lights of the city twinkling below ...Ben Johnson failing to reach the 100 metres final (thank goodness)...Sally Gunnell leading into the turn in the 400m hurdles final, and maintaining that lead to the line ahead of the gaudy figure of Sandra Farmer-Patrick of the United States...Chris Boardman grinning after winning the individual pursuit cycling gold by a metaphorical mile...

1996...Atlanta...the night of the bomb, wandering through the city streets trying to get a comment from one unwilling soul after another and beginning to realise that I might have done better to have stayed put at the digs and watched CNN... ears reverberating the chanting of "USA...USA" as the home gymnasts secure the gymnastics women's team gold despite the drama of Kerri Strug's fall and rise for her final vault...Frankie Fredericks running a personal best of 19.66sec for the 200m and not getting anywhere near Michael Johnson...being told by a marshal that I could not walk 20 yards into a venue as I had not arrived by bus, and having to hitch a very short lift in a carful of Japanese photographers...

2000...being told by a bus driver "Where do you want to go?" (What? You mean you are here for Me?)...Watching cyclist Jason Queally set an Olympic record in the individual pursuit on day one of the Games, and then seeing all remaining riders fail to match it as the Briton, looking on from the centre of the arena, became assured of bronze, then silver, then gold...Cathy Freeman sitting stunned after winning the 400m gold medal for herself and, oh yes, the entire host nation with special reference to its native Aboriginal people...seeing Denise Lewis embracing her coach Charles van Commenee in the mixed zone after she had held her injured body together for long enough to take heptathlon gold...

2004...witnessing the effective no man's land around the Olympic Stadium, which had been finished in the nick of time, but with no time for landscaping...watching the marathon finish in the small, marble stadium which had hosted the first Modern Games of 1896...walking into a press conference the day after Britain's men had won the 4x100m gold so unexpectedly, seeing the beaming faces of Messrs Campbell, Gardener, Devonish and Lewis-Francis and coming out with the incisive journalistic response: "Well done!"..

The imposing Bird's Nest stadium remains strong in the mind following Beijing 2008

2008...watching Christine Ohuruogu add an Olympic 400m title to the world title she had won the previous year in a stupendous demonstration of strength and willpower...walking to the massive Bird's Nest stadium every night and seeing photo after photo being taken of a spectators holding up their arms in an appearance of grasping the Olympic Torch which flamed at the end of the arena...

And 2012? The memories of the London 2012 Olympics and Paralympics are so close that it is hard to know what will persist. But there is now a comprehensive reminder of the Games which sat so happily in the middle of what has already been described as a golden summer of sport – in the form of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games' official commemorative book, which is entitled, not unreasonably, The Official Commemorative Book (Wiley, £29.99).

Tom Knight and Sybil Ruscoe are the authors behind the commemorative book

Written by former Daily Telegraph athletics correspondent Tom Knight and Sybil Ruscoe, the journalist and broadcaster, this handsome tome comes with a foreword from Sebastian Coe, chairman of London 2012 and the man credited so hugely with the manifest success of the whole enterprise.

"When our time came, we got it right," writes Coe. "And I am incredibly proud to say that all this was made in Britain. I hope the London 2012 Games made you proud too, and that this beautiful book will rekindle memories of an incredible summer and be treasured and shared for many years to come."

A succinct introduction makes it clear that, for all the magnificent leverage exerted by Coe, the gaining of the Games involved huge efforts from a large number of people. After the disappointments of three failures to gain the Games either for Birmingham or Manchester, the London bid for which, it became clear, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) had always been waiting, was set in motion by a British Olympic Association (BOA) feasibility report produced by David Luckes, goalkeeper in Britain's hockey team at the 1996 Games. David Welch, the late sports editor of the Daily Telegraph, did all he could to energise the idea of a home bid.

And massive credit went to Tessa Jowell, then Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, for gradually persuading a host of Cabinet colleagues including the Prime Minister himself, of whom she asked: "Tell me what the answer to this question is – we are the fourth largest economy in the world, we are a nation who love our sport and we think London is the greatest city in the world, yet we don't dare to bid for the Olympic Games?"

The London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games Official Commemorative Book is full of riches

So much for the groundwork. The bulk of the book picks out the stories and exploits of the Games that will resound down the years, complemented by numerous apt and startling images. A detailed results section at the end of the book frees the text to adopt a newspaper-type attitude to the sporting events of the summer, featuring the juiciest items.

I am dipping into it at random now. "Lightning Bolt strikes again in 100m final." And again: "Broken jaw bronze for Team GB" – the tale of hockey captain Kate Walsh's courageous and instant return from a horrible injury. Paralympic table tennis – a picture of Poland's Natalia Partyka, intent on a serve, en route for another gold as she maintained her 12-year unbeaten run at the Paralympics.

The book is full of riches. Recommended.

To order a copy of the book click here.

Mike Rowbottom, one of Britain's most talented sportswriters, has covered the past five Summer and four Winter Olympics for The Independent. Previously he has worked for the Daily Mail, The Times, The Observer, the Sunday Correspondent and The Guardian. He is now chief feature writer for insidethegames.

Dr C K Wu, the redoubtable boss of AIBA, the body that rules international amateur boxing, seems relentless in his desire to give the professional side of the sport a black eye.

He wants to make amateur boxing sufficiently financially attractive to deter the best young Olympic boxers from turning pro after the Games.

He is also adopting, for AIBA's World Series Boxing (WSB), and possibly the Olympics, several professional elements including a ten-point scoring system and abandoning headguards and vests on top, of six-figure prize money.

No harm in that – but what worries me is the continuation of AIBA's ridiculously anachronistic bar on professional coaches like GB's excellent Robert McCracken from the corner.

To do this while embracing other facets of the pro game smacks of hypocrisy.

Moreover, there are disturbing rumours that Dr Wu, who apparently has ambitions to run for the Presidency of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) next year, would like to go even further – and force national boxing associations to sever all ties with professionals, which would mean that McCracken and other paid coaches would not be allowed even to work with boxers in the gym, or professional boxers to spar with amateurs (surely now a misnomer).

AIBA's rules against professional coaches bans the likes of Britain's Rob McCracken from the corner

I hope this is not so, for it would create uproar and anarchy within the sport and suggest that AIBA are getting too big for their boxing boots.

Of course, Dr Wu is entitled to fight to keep the best Olympians in his sport, but that fight must be kept fair.

Turning pro after winning an Olympic medal has always been a natural transition and it would be delusional to think, for instance, that the current super-heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua, with his punch and persona, could be swayed by a package to stay amateur that could not come anywhere near the millions he would make by signing with US promoters Golden Boy or Britain's Frank Warren.

It is true that today's economic climate makes turning pro  a less  automatic option for Olympians than in the days of Muhammad Ali, Joe Frazier, Sugar Ray Leonard, Wladimir Klitschko and more recently Andre Ward and James DeGale.

But it can still be a good living, usually well above anything even a "professionalised" amateur game can offer.

Not that it always has the happiest of endings.

I have been reflecting on the varying fortunes of three famous fighting Olympians who cashed in their medals – gold, silver and bronze respectively – and made millions yet whose careers, for different reasons have become somewhat blighted.

The golden boy is Audley Harrison, Olympic super-heavyweight champion at Sydney 2000 who surely would have been better off fistically, though not fiscally, by staying amateur, a game he knew inside out.

Audley Harrison's career came crashing down around him during a recent fight with David Price

"Fraudley's" professional career, built on a £1 million ($1.6 million/€1.2 million) BBC cheque, has been a bit of a joke, culminating in the recent 82-second humiliation at the hands of Beijing 2008 bronze medallist David Price – who really looks the business.

When Harrison came into the Liverpool ring we should have guessed the inevitable, unless they were to prevent his knees from knocking!

The silver medallist (at Athens 2004) is Amir Khan, who ascended to the world light-welterweight title but has lost his last two bouts and dented his image by getting himself on the front page of a Sunday tabloid this week following an alleged sex romp in Marbella.

His American fiancée, daughter of a Manhattan multi-millionaire, is said to be less than amused.

And so to the bronze medal winner – Evander Holyfield (Los Angeles 1984), whose tale of misfortune is truly astonishing.

He probably made more money than any other Olympian in history but has blown it all.

Evander Holyfield has probably made more money than any other Olympian in history but has blown it all

"I've still got hope," says Holyfield, who turned 50 a fortnight ago, and finally admitted that his fighting days may be over. But what he doesn't have is money, despite banking £350 million ($560 million/€430 million), half of it from his 57 fights, in his 28-year career.

The "Real Deal", one of the greatest fighters of all time, now flat broke and bankrupt, is having to sell everything except his soul to pay off debts, which amount to over £10 million ($16 million/€12 million).

Virtually his whole life goes under the hammer in a Beverley Hills auction room on November 30 in what is believed to be the world's greatest-ever sale of sporting memorabilia.

Even by boxing's depressing history Holyfield's road to ruin has been spectacular, a fortune squandered on the roulette wheels and blackjack tables of Las Vegas and Atlantic City, business misadventures, crippling lawsuits and lavish spending on a lifestyle that has been as much that of a champion philanderer as pugilist.

He has been divorced three times, has 11 children by five different women and owes half a million dollars for child support – including an 18-year-old daughter Emani, who last month sued him for $372,000 (£230,600/€287,400) in unpaid maintenance. He was been ordered by a Georgia court to pay $2,950 (£1,800/€2,300) a month or go to jail.

On top of this, he has been evicted from his 109-room Atlanta mansion, a sumptuous pad the Beckhams would die for, owing $14 million (£8.7 million/€10.8 million) in mortgage repayments. It was sold at a knockdown price of $7.5 million (£4.7 million/€5.8 million) to keep the banks off his back. He now lives alone in a downtown condominium.

Holyfield's financial woes started in 1999 when his then wife of two years, Janice, filed for divorce after he had publicly admitted to fathering two children out of wedlock.

Evander Holyfield's most prized possession, a 1962 red Chevrolet Corvette speedster, will go under the hammer at Julien's

"These are difficult days," Holyfield acknowledged recently. "Dealing with all the mothers of all my kids – there ain't no winning here man, no winning at all.

"I've had no money to pay lawyers and had to fight on my own in court and that ain't easy."

Holyfield has been declared bankrupt after blowing some $230 million (£140 million/€180 million), earnings from those 57 fights in which his lowest purse was $600,000 (£380,000/€460,000) and biggest $33 million (£21 million/€25 million) – the 1997 bout in which Mike Tyson took a bite out of his ear. His gloves, boots, and robe from that infamous encounter are up for sale at Julien's, the US equivalent of Sotheby's on November 30, alongside jewellery, including numerous Rolex and Cartier watches, furniture, and ring memorabilia including 27 other pairs of gloves, his Olympic bronze medal, world title belts and what he says is his most prized possession, a 1962 red Chevrolet Corvette speedster, the same vintage as himself.

There is no reserve on any item. Everything must go, according to Darren Julien, President of the Californian auction house, who estimates the sale will fetch from $3 million - $5 million (£1.9 million - £3.1 million/€2.3 million - €3.9 million), and jokes that if the piece of ear gnawed off by Tyson was available, that probably would be auctioned off too, such is Holyfield's need for solvency.

The belt presented to Evander Holyfield by The Ring magazine for being named 1997 Boxer of the Year is also up for auction

Lolo Jones may have made her rather lovely name as a track athlete, but one could accuse her of having a one-track mind. Following this week's announcement that she has earned a place as a pusher in the US women's bobsleigh team she has started down a new and far icier track which may yet lead to an appearance at the 2014 Sochi Winter Games.

Should the 30-year-old from Des Moines continue to perform on ice as well as she has in the last month – which is all the time it has required for her to earn this particular sporting call-up – there is a good chance that she will be in competitive action in Russia when the Games get underway beside the Black Sea on February 7.

Certainly the US bobsleigh coach, Todd Hays, appears confident that the high hurdler who narrowly missed out on Olympic medals in 2008 and this summer in London, and who has also collected two International Associations of Athletics Federation (IAAF) world indoor titles, has what it takes.

"I didn't have a lot of time to get to know Lolo through the media," he said after announcing her inclusion in the squad alongside another top class athlete, 27-year-old Tianna Madison, who won an Olympic gold medal at London 2012 as part of the sprint relay team and finished fourth in the 100m final. "These three weeks I've gotten to know her as an athlete.  And she surprised me every day with how dedicated she is. The one word I keep coming back to is, she is such a competitor.  She cannot accept not being good at something. She gets up earlier than everyone else, goes to bed later, constantly trying to get better.

"Lolo and Tianna accepted the challenge to compete for a spot on the team, and they did an incredible job. They are just tenacious competitors that want to win at everything they do. It wouldn't matter if it was ping pong, checkers or bobsled."

Jones herself, who intends to maintain her athletics career and seek further success, with the 2016 Rio Olympics still firmly in the frame, described her wintry wandering as "a breath of fresh air – cool, very cool, cold air." Which was true both literally and metaphorically. She made it clear that she felt she had needed to step away from athletics for a while and to freshen up her motivation. That job appears to have been well done.

Lolo Jones has now the United States women's bobsleigh team "pusher"

Jones will be far from the first to come to this sport from track and field. Apart from Madison, she also has as colleagues two top class university athletes in Aja Evans and Cherelle Garrett. And among the unsuccessful candidates for a place in the team this year was Hyleas Fountain, heptathlon silver medallist at the 2008 Beijing Games.

Back in 1976, Meinhard Nehmer, a member of east Germany's two-man and four-man crew at the Innsbruck Games, arrived from a background as a javelin thrower. He won two golds, and added a gold and a silver at the 1980 Lake Placid Games before going on to coach a number of bobsleigh teams, including the United States.

In the women's competition, the Canadian pair who won the Olympic silver medal at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics, Helen Upperton and Shelley-Ann Brown, both had athletics connections. Upperton was a former triple jumper at the University of Texas, and Brown went to the University of Nebraska on a track and field scholarship.

Britain has its own history of athletes crossing over to bobsleigh – albeit with varying degrees of success.

Former sprinter Lenny Paul competed for Britain at four successive winter Games from 1988 to 1998, finishing sixth in 1994 in the two-man bob with Mark Tout. Unfortunately Paul earned unwanted fame when he tried to explain an adverse doping finding for the banned steroid nandrolone by saying he had eaten tainted meat in a spaghetti bolognese. The excuse didn't work – but let's hope he enjoyed his meal anyway.

Allyn Condon joined Dan Money, John Jackson and Henry Nwume to make the Great Britain four man bobsleigh team at the 2010 Winter Games

In 2010, former sprinter Allyn Condon, who won sprint relay golds at world junior, European and Commonwealth level, became only the second person to have competed for Britain at a Summer and Winter Games – after Marcus Adam, who ran in the 200m and sprint relay at the Barcelona 1992 Olympics and finished tenth in the two-man bob at the Salt Lake Winter Games a decade later – when he competed in the four man bob at the Vancouver Olympics, a decade after he had run in the Sydney Games.

Condon and co had high hopes of a top eight finish until a 150kph crash at the bend known as 50/50 left them on their heads – and eventually in 17th place.

In 2008, Britain's former decathlete Dean Macey – the Commonwealth gold medallist and world silver and bronze medallist who finished fourth in two Olympics – took up a challenge to qualify as part of the bobsleigh team at the 2010 Olympics.

Macey teamed up in a two-man bob with old colleague Jason Gardener, an Olympic gold medallist in the 2004 sprint relay and former world indoor and European champion, and the pair performed very respectably in the 2008 British Championships at Cesena Pariol in Italy, finishing sixth.

Gardener later declined an offer to continue trying to make the team as a brakeman. Macey ended up commentating on the Vancouver Winter Games for Eurosport.

Dean Macey, Jason Gardener, Craid MacLean and Dan Luger of Great Britain bobsleigh team

At the same British championships, another freshly created sporting duo – former England rugby international Dan Luger and ex-Olympic cyclist Craig MacLean – crashed out, with the BBC recording all for the documentary they made on the four sportsmen's effort to make a winter Olympic splash.

Doubling up in bobsleigh from other sports is also a clearly established template of course – indeed, it was the one followed by the only competitor to have won gold at a summer and winter Games, Eddie Eagan, who was victorious in the four man bob at the 1932 Lake Placid Olympics 12 years after taking Olympic gold at Antwerp in the light heavyweight boxing event.

Returning to women's bobsleigh, one of the US pairing which took silver at the 2006 Winter Games in Turin, Shauna Rohbock, was a former professional footballer for San Diego Spirit. And Heather Moyse, brakewoman with driver Kaillie Humphries in the gold medal Canadian pair at the 2010 Games, is a former Canadian international in both rugby and cycling.

Switching to bobsleigh often works, and quite often means Olympic medals. Hays should know well enough himself – he was an American Football player and national kick boxing champion before he won the first Olympic bobsleigh medal for the United States in 46 years by winning silver in the four-man bob at the 2002 Salt Lake Winter Games.

Mike Rowbottom, one of Britain's most talented sportswriters, has covered the past five Summer and four Winter Olympics for The Independent. Previously he has worked for the Daily Mail, The Times, The Observer, the Sunday Correspondent and The Guardian. He is now chief feature writer for insidethegames. 

On that famous day of July 6, 2005, when the London 2012 bid sneaked to victory, I strangely remember one image more clearly than any other.

It isn't that of those jubilant scenes of celebration at Trafalgar Square when International Olympic Committee (IOC) President Jacques Rogge declared the city had won the right host the Games.

It is actually that image of sheer disappointment and bemusement in Paris city centre as the French public wondered just how they had been beaten by their British rivals by the slender margin of four votes in Singapore when they had seemingly been favourites from the start.

Equally fascinating to watch was how French jealousy towards London turned slowly to relief as a worldwide recession hit and Britain were left to shell out billions in costs to stage the greatest sporting event on earth.

France itself has been hit nearly as hard as any other country by the economic downturn.

The citizens of Paris were left disappointed and bemused after losing out to London in their bid to host the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games

"You won't find many French people who are unhappy at losing the Olympics now," said Parisian security consultant Christophe Anglard before the start of London 2012.

"And in England you will find a lot of people who are worried about the amount of money that is being spent.

"When the Games begin maybe we will talk about sport, but at the moment the economy is all that matters here now."

London, however, has been resourceful.

Continually I hear the figure of £2.4 billion ($4 billion/€2.9 billion) crop up. That was indeed the "original estimate" for London 2012.

However, it was a figure that failed to take into account key factors such as Organising Committee overheads, security costs, contingency against risks, operational provisions, city operations and transport among other things.

It was unsurprising when in 2007, once the Government was in a situation to give a realistic budget with all these aspects taken into account, there was a collective gasp when they set the figure at £9.298 billion ($14.87 billion/€11.43 billion) for the Games.

Sport and Olympics Minister Hugh Robertson has had to fight off wave after wave of attack on all aspects of London 2012’s spending

But for those close to the process, this was no surprise, and Government has been held accountable ever since – for five long years.

Usually its main trials would come at its own Quarterly Economic Report briefing, mostly held at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport's modest headquarters in central London.

Often these briefings have been tense affairs, with Sport and Olympics Minister Hugh Robertson having to fight off wave after wave of attack on all aspects of London 2012 spending.

One such notable incident occurred at the end of last year, when he was forced to defend the decision to double the original £41 million ($64 million/€48 million) budget for the Ceremonies of the Games.

Having seen the Ceremonies, most now back the decision – but that wasn't the case at the time.

However, in the last ever Quarterly Economic Report briefing, Robertson cut the most relaxed of figures as he revealed that the Games are set to come in at £8.921 billion ($14.26 billion/€10.96 billion) or less, meaning a saving of £377 million ($603 million/€463 million).

Asked if that £377 million ($603 million/€463 million) would be kept by sport, he came out with undoubtedly the best line I have heard him deliver.

"That money is in the Treasury already; it's not like I'm Smaug the dragon, sitting on a pile of treasure and not letting others get to it," he fantastically explained.

Perhaps of more relevance, he told us how Foreign Secretary William Hague had a recent conversation with him (Robertson) explaining that over 40 leaders from abroad had started every meeting with him congratulating him about London 2012.

The Government was criticised for doubling the budget for the London 2012 Ceremonies last year but the shows have since been praised as a spectacular success

Since that briefing, it has emerged that London 2012 has helped boost Britain out its longest double-dip recession, with Olympic and Paralympic ticket sales contributing 0.2 per cent to the 1.0 per cent growth, incidentally the biggest growth figure in five years.

Critics will still remain, but they should perhaps look at the Athens 2004 Games, where costs spiralled due to not staying on track with construction, or maybe as recently as the Delhi 2010 Commonwealth Games, when a major bridge collapsed outside the main stadium just days before the event began.

London didn't have those problems, nor did it have to spend the eye watering $44 billion (£27. 3 billion/€34 billion billion) that Beijing spent on its Games in 2008.

Yet everyone who attended the event has hailed it as the best ever and London's reputation around the globe has now skyrocketed, so much so that the city will provide the majority of the backdrop for the new James Bond film Skyfall which hasn't always been the case with Britain's favourite MI6 agent.

James Bond is happy to appear in a London rejuvenated by the 2012 Olympics and Paralympics in the franchises’ latest instalment Skyfall

It is always good, and often easy, to criticise.

But perhaps, with the year of 2012 drawing to a close, everyone involved in staging the London Olympics and Paralympics deserves a huge congratulations.

It is a Games the likes of which we won't see matched for a long, long time.

Tom Degun is a reporter for insidethegames

While Bradley Wiggins remains odds-on favourite with the bookies to win the revamped BBC Sports Personality of the Year award on December 16 there are growing concerns within the cycling fraternity that he and other two-wheeled contenders such as Sir Chris Hoy, Laura Trott and Victoria Pendleton may suffer in the wake of the Lance Armstrong doping scandal.

While there is absolutely no suggestion that Tour de France winner and Olympic gold medallist Wiggins or any of Britain's Olympic cycling stars have ever had anything to do with drugs, the fear is that theirs has become an indelibly tainted sport and that the public vote will be adversely affected by the revelations.

We are assured that all Team GB Olympic cyclists and those with Team Sky are clean as the proverbial whistle.

But after what we have learned from the Armstrong revelations can anyone be blamed for wondering if in the past any cyclist who has achieved glory may have done so with more than a little help from the dodgy side of sports medicine?

No doubt the majority haven't. But can we be sure? Is giving a cyclist the accolade taking too big a risk?

Probably not, which makes Daley Thompson's call for cycling to be driven from the Olympics quite hypocritical. Coming from a sport which bred Ben Johnson and a host of other druggies too numerous to mention, some close to his homeland here, he must be having a laugh.

"Armstrong is a cheating b***** and his sport is warped and damaged by drugs," he roars.

No argument there.

But can't the same be said for athletics, or weightlifting? Are they to be expelled too?

"The International Cycling Union (UCI) are not fit for purpose...the International Olympic Committee (IOC) must demand that this disgraceful governing body put its house in order," says Thompson

Now that we agree with.

The actions of Armstrong, now stripped of his seven Tour victories (but not yet his Olympic bronze), and the truly incompetent and shamefully intransigent UCI, have scarred cycling irrevocably at a time when interest and participation in it has never been greater.

That's the real tragedy.

Has the Lance Armstrong doping scandal tarnished Bradley Wiggins' chance of claiming the BBC Sports Personality of the Year award?

Now there seems a good chance that the disgraced and discredited Armstrong and those who rode with him could affect the outcome Britain's most prestigious sports award, which would be a shame, even though Wiggins would not be my choice for an entirely different reason, which I will come to later.

One SPOTY controversy that certainly will be avoided this year is that which hit the 2011 award, when not a single woman was shortlisted by an all-male panel.

Not only has the shortlist been extended from 10 to 12, but the 12-strong panel which will decide on it includes half-a-dozen females and is headed by ex-gymnast Barbara Slater, the director of BBC Sport (she's the daughter of an Olympian, too – the former Wolves and England footballer Bill Slater who represented Team GB at the Helsinki 1952 Games).

Other redoubtable women on the panel are Dame Tanni Grey-Thompson, Denise Lewis, broadcaster Eleanor Oldroyd, sports journalist Sue Mott and UK Sport chair Baroness Sue Campbell.

They will sit alongside Sir Steve Redgrave, BBC's head of sport Philip Barnie, programme editor Carl Doran, and the sports editors of The Sun, The Observer and The Daily Mail – all male, by the way. Fleet Street hasn't stepped through this particular glass ceiling just yet.

So will a woman win? Unlikely, according to William Hill, who now put Andy Murray second favourite ahead of Mo Farah and Jessica Ennis. But coming up fast on the rails is wheelchair wizard David Weir although fellow Paralympian Ellie Simmonds, who makes the fact that she is a Paralympian secondary to her success and who oozes personality – the commodity the award nominally represents – remains a 66-1 outsider.

Similarly, the delightful Nicola Adams (100-1), who so changed the views about women's boxing among the more chauvinistic of my ringside colleagues that the Boxing Writers' Club last week gave her a special award at the hitherto men-only annual dinner.

Nicola Adams, the first woman to win an Olympic boxing gold medal, is 100-1 odds to win the BBC Sports Personality of the Year award

Nicola would be my choice over Wiggins, Farah or Ennis. She's a joyous bundle of fistic fun, her smile, her fortitude and her achievement exactly epitomise what the award should represent in a year unsurpassed for sporting endeavour.

Actually, we are unprecedentedly spoiled for choice. You can even make out a case for nominating Seb Coe as the prime architect of the most stupendous sports event ever to be held in Britain. Without him running the show, it would not have happened as superbly as it did. No question.

Or Clare Balding, the undoubted small screen star of the Games – and just about every other event she has fronted. At least she she will co-host SPOTY alongside Sue Barker and Gary Lineker. Good choice.

Or how about the now-retired Frankel, the world's number one racehorse, unbeaten in 14 races and whose performance in the 2000 Guineas has been described as "one of the greatest displays on a British racecourse".

In any other year Andy Murray surely would be a shoo-in after winning an historic US Open title and reaching the Wimbledon final but this has to be the year of the Olympian.

Yes, I know Murray did win an Olympic gold medal too but that defining word "personality" comes into play again in my book, coupled with charisma and public affection.

Olympic gold medallist Andy Murray is second favourite according to William Hill

My preference for these annual polls has always been the one organised by the Sports Journalists Association which gives us the opportunity to vote separately for male and female candidates.

The BBC did consider switching to this format but decided against it. Pity.

The "12 for 2012" will be selected by the expert panel, says Barbara Slater, then face a public vote on the night of December 16, with the winner chosen by telephone poll before a paying audience of more than 15,000 at London's ExCeL, appropriately an Olympics venue.

The panel will also select the winners of the International Sports Personality of the Year (might as well hand that to Usain Bolt now); Coach of the Year; and Team of the Year, which could be a close contest between the European Ryder Cup golfers, and cycling's Olympic squad and Team Sky, which helped Wiggins to become the first British winner of the Tour de France.

Just as long as Lance Armstrong doesn't put a spoke in Wiggo's wheel of fortune.

Alan Hubbard is an award-winning sports columnist for The Independent on Sunday, and a former sports editor of The Observer. He has covered a total of 16 Summer and Winter Olympics, 10 Commonwealth Games, several football World Cups and world title fights from Atlanta to Zaire.

There are, of course, British athletes whose mental preparation appears to be spot-on for the big occasion. Jessica Ennis, Mo Farah, Greg Rutherford – all delivered as expected at this summer's London Olympics; Rutherford, indeed, delivered over and above.

But the final figure of six medals garnered on home ground by British athletes – albeit that four were gold – fell two short of the target set by UK Athletic's performance director, Charles van Commenee. And so the Dutchman walked, and Neil Black, a well-regarded physiotherapist and sports scientist took over, with an immediate brief to find a new head coach.

But Black's first "signing" has not been a head coach – although it has been a "head coach" in one sense – because the new man at UK Athletics is the renowned sports psychiatrist – Dr Steve Peters.

When he took over his new role, Black said he regarded himself as a "harder" man than Van Commenee, which raised more than a few eyebrows given the former incumbent's hard-line attitude to the achievement of targets – an attitude, indeed, which dictated his own decision to leave.

Black explained that his "hardness" pertained to a desire to push things harder and more quickly than even Van Commenee had done. But his subsequent comments shed light on the Van Commenee dynamic which some within the sport had found difficult to take.

"Charles would go and say [to athletes] 'You're underperforming', and that's great for some and absolutely terrible for others," Black said. "Some people love him for his directness and some people think he's a monster."

The "directness" of which Black spoke was never more in evidence than at the Athens 2004 Olympics, when Van Commenee reduced one the athletes he coached, British heptathlete Kelly Sotherton, to tears after she had won a bronze medal. Van Commenee felt she should have pushed harder for silver.

Charles van Commenee accused Kelly Sotherton of settling for Bronze at Athens 2004

Now UK Athletics has a man who is likely to approach the motivation of elite performers in a different and, dare one say, subtler fashion.

Peters' success in moulding the minds of Britain's all-conquering cyclists over the last decade has been abundant, and widely acknowledged. Sir Chris Hoy and Victoria Pendleton are among the competitors who have paid tribute to his ability to help them cast out the negative and optimise their performances.

I got an insight into how this process worked when I interviewed Peters a few months after the Beijing 2008 Games after he had passed on some of his thoughts to 80 promising young sports performers gathered at a Youth Sports Trust camp at Loughborough University.

Peters made it clear early on that he is not a psychologist, but a psychiatrist who worked in hospital medicine before taking up his full-time position with British Cycling. If you want to get technical about it, his full title is Dr Steve Peters MBBS MRCPsych BA PGCE MEd (medical) Dip Sports Med Consultant Psychiatrist/Undergraduate Dean Sheffield Medical School.

Oh yes, and he's a former World Masters 200 metres champion too.

Other than that, however, just a sad under-achiever...

Steve Peters (L) has used his mind techniques on the likes of Sir Chris Hoy, Bradley Wiggins (R) and Victoria Pendleton

Peters explained to the youngsters present that their brains had different compartments. The conscious part of them at the front of their heads sat alongside a section deeper in their head which contained, in his phrase, "a chimp". This chimp is the instinctive force which countermands positive efforts with mutterings of defeatism and doom.

The cyclist wants to put his body on the line in the hectic and dangerous environment of a steeply-banked track filled with brakeless machines going pell-mell. The chimp chips in with comments such as "I can't do this" or "I'm going to break my neck".

What Peters specialises in, he maintains, is "chimp-management". His expertise lies in getting sporting figures to get their unruly chimp under control, or, if this proves particularly difficult, putting the chimp away into a temporary box.

What he terms "gremlins and goblins" lurk elsewhere in the brain, ready to inform the aspiring sportsman or woman at the crucial moment that they feel terrible, and that they are going to lose, and that everything is riding on this one moment. They too can be eradicated or quelled.

"Chris Hoy knows his chimp very well," said Peters. "He has gone on record as saying his achievements are all about 'boxing the chimp'. Victoria Pendleton is one of my best pupils. She used to get extremely frustrated about dealing with her 'chimp'.

"Several years ago we timed how long it took her to get completely in control of her feelings before competing, and it was one hour and 20 minutes. Nowadays she can do that in five minutes."

If Steve Peters (L) can replicate his British Cycling success at UK Athletics it will be great to see the athletes believe they can achieve

Peters himself maintained that he doesn't have any problems from his own chimp for this very good reason:

"I've got a gorilla". He added: "People are amazed when I lose my temper. It doesn't happen very often but I'm no different to anyone else. I'm human."

Sir Chris, Pendleton and co might dispute that – they evidently believe Peters is a little bit superhuman. But it will be fascinating to see how this mastermind of mind-mastering gets on with the challenge of making Britain's athletes believe they can achieve.

It would be good to see Martyn Rooney, for instance, the 400m runner who finished so deflated and self-critical after failing to live up to home hopes at the London 2012 Olympics, entering next year's IAAF World Championships in a better frame of mind. It would be good to see the men's sprint relay team managing to get the baton safely round the track. It would be good to see...a British women's sprint relay team at all.

Of course, there will be many factors in play to bring such changes about. But if Peters can replicate his British Cycling success, then UK Athletics is surely onto a very good thing.

Mike Rowbottom, one of Britain's most talented sportswriters, has covered the past five Summer and four Winter Olympics for The Independent. Previously he has worked for the Daily Mail, The Times, The Observer, the Sunday Correspondent and The Guardian. He is now chief feature writer for insidethegames.

In the lead up to the 2012 European Championship, everything in Britain was telling us that the tournament in Ukraine and Poland would be one to forget.

BBC's Panorama went a step further, claiming that racism was rife and that all football fans should expect trouble and even violence from the "aggressive" locals, particularly in Ukraine, who took savage joy in confrontation.

Of course hindsight showed us that this could not be further from the truth.

Both Poland and Ukraine excelled, the fans loved the event and it was hailed by UEFA President Michel Platini as one of the greatest ever editions of the tournament.

Undoubtedly boosted by such acclaim, Ukraine has unsurprisingly now set its sights a little higher, with the 2022 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games being the primary objective.

Rumours of the bid have been circulating for some time while the idea is said to be the brainchild of Sergey Bubka - the President of the Ukrainian National Olympic Committee (NOC).

Bubka, an International Olympic Committee (IOC) Board member, is someone whom I have always regarded as one of the more fascinating people at the very top of sport politics.

Now 48-years-old, Bubka still possesses the giant, muscular frame and physique that saw him become the greatest pole vaulter on the planet.

Sergey Bubka still possesses the physique that helped him become the best pole vault athlete on the planet

In a stellar career, he won an Olympic gold, six consecutive world titles and set a world record of 6.15 metres that no one has come close to matching.

It is perhaps for this reason that he has something of a mystique and is considered a stern and imposing individual. It helps some paint him as the pantomime villain to Britain's smiling Sebastian Coe, with the two surely set to clash in the battle for the Presidency of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) when incumbent Lamine Diack decides to step down in the coming years.

However, perceptions of Bubka are far from the truth.

He is in fact a funny, charming and instantly likeable individual who I've never run into without receiving a smile and the warmest of handshakes from.

And, contrary to popular belief, he is actually good friends with Coe.

But the story here is of a Winter Olympic and Paralympic bid that he will surely lead.

The beautiful Carpathian Mountains near Lviv will be at the heart of Ukraine’s plans to host the 2022 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games

And it was an issue that took primary position at the Ukrainian Sport Congress in the capital Kyiv.

It was a congress that I was fascinated to attend as it saw every Ukrainian summer and winter sport federation represented.

In attendance were senior figures including Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, Deputy Prime Minister Borys Kolesnikov, IOC Executive Board member Pat Hickey and, of course, Bubka.

Ironically, Bubka and I arrived at the same time and he couldn't suppress a smile as he saw me looking a little weathered following a rather late evening out in the lovely city the night before.

Rather helpfully, he also ensured I made it into the congress after I misplaced my official invitation (one of the perks of knowing one of Ukraine's greatest ever athletes).

And with that, we were in.

I shall spare you the full details of the congress, but it is safe to say that the bid was a core theme.

Lviv was to be the bid city and the nearby Carpathian Mountains, the second-longest mountain range in Europe, the core location of the bid.

Arena Lviv ensured that the beautiful city hosted matches at Euro 2012

It was explained the huge benefits bidding would have on the small region, which successfully hosted Games during Euro 2012.

The plans look extremely impressive, but even without the United States, who have ruled out a bid for the 2022 edition of the Games, there will almost certainly be stiff competition.

France, Germany, Norway, Poland, Spain and Switzerland have all suggested they will move for the biggest prize in winter sport.

But armed with a wonderful story of regional regeneration, which we all know is a popular theme with the IOC, and a certain Sergey Bubka, they will be formidable contenders.

And it is that man Bubka who is the ace in the pack.

A bid leader cannot win a bid single-handed, but they can be very useful indeed; as Coe showed only too well with the London 2012 bid in Singapore in 2005.

Sebastian Coe (L) and Sergey Bubka (R) are two of the most influential figures in the Olympic Movement that can help shape a bid race

So combine Bubka, a great city, a country that wants to improve at winter sport and a story that could see the IOC help give the city of Lviv a lasting sporting legacy and you have a very real prospect of a 2022 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games in Ukraine.

Tom Degun is a reporter for insidethegames

A decade ago, New Zealand band The Datsuns drove their profile to a high point as they made a name for themselves in Britain following an appearance on John Peel's Radio 1 show, prompting the British music press to describe them as "the future of rock."

That was a big claim, and one which, a decade on, The Datsuns are still trying to live up to. But in the meantime their guitarist, Phil Buscke, has another challenge on his mind – getting squash into the Olympics.

Buscke is a spectacular guitarist – but as he says himself, squash is his first love. When The Datsuns were wowing Peel and the Britons in 2002, he was training with the New Zealand squad for the Manchester 2002 Commonwealth Games squash tournament, and although he eventually focused on music rather than sport by joining the high-flying band, he is still a grade A player who is well within the national top 20.

Three years ago, Buscke threw himself off Auckland Harbour Bridge in full media view clutching a banner reading: "Squash 2016 – Squash & the Olympics, a perfect match." Much as he loves the game, Buscke was not making the ultimate sacrifice in support of the sport's bid to get into the Rio Games – he bounced back up on the thick elastic of bungee jumping equipment.

Sadly for him, and his beloved sport, no place was granted in the Olympic arena as golf and rugby sevens took the two available slots for Rio. Four years after the disappointment of missing out on the London 2012 Games, squash had been bounced out once again, it's only Olympic experience still the tenuous one of having rackets, a precursor to the modern game of squash, included in the London Games of 1908.

As the sport rallies to seek an Olympic entrance at the third time of asking, efforts are being compounded today into World Squash Day, which will be supported by approximately 40,000 players all around the globe who will be getting on court and highlighting the manifest strengths of the case for inclusion in the Games.

Buscke, as you might expect, is doing his bit once again, and will be challenging members of the rugby union world championship-winning All Blacks to test their fitness against him on court. It looks like there will only be one winner there.

Phil Buscke of The Dutsans bungee jumps from Auckland Harbour bridge holding a "Squash 2016 – Squash & the Olympics, a perfect match" sign

World Squash Day will be celebrated throughout Asia, with events in China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Nepal, Pakistan, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand.

African nations taking part include Malawi, Namibia, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda and Zimbabwe.

Arab nations include Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and UAE.

Across north, south and central America, competing nations include Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Mexico, Peru, and USA.

World Squash Day activities will feature in the new men's PSA World Tour event in San Francisco, where a 20-up College Challenge will take place on the glass court by the San Francisco waterfront between Stanford University and California University-Berkeley and University of Southern California.

European nations involved include Armenia, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, England, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Holland, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Jersey, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Scotland, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Ukraine and Wales.

Exotic island squash outposts include the Bahamas, Bermuda, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Cook Islands, Norfolk Island, Trinidad and Tobago, plus St Vincent and The Grenadines.

Quite honestly, isn't that list enough in itself to secure an Olympic place?

You might think so, but the World Squash Federation (WSF) – whose membership has risen from 147 to 185 countries since its last Olympic bid - has not allowed itself the luxury of resting on any laurels as it has maintained maximum pressure within the last three years to take on board all comment and criticism from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and to strive even harder to market and popularise the sport.

World number one Nick Matthew, James Willstrop and Ramy Ashour join the 35,000 registered players to back the bid for inclusion in the 2020 Olympics

The recently re-elected WSF President, N Ramachandran, has been vigorously pointing out the urgency with which is sport is courting the IOC's favour. Among the features which have helped squash widen its fan base and increase its TV exposure is a new scoring system which allows players to take points on their opponent's serve.

Top games now take place in all-glass demountable courts which are inexpensive and, according to the WSF, "leave no white elephant facility problems."

As such, the courts are fully in tune with the new thinking involved in Olympic infrastructure, whereby facilities to be maintained as legacies are balanced off with those which can simply be dismantled and recycled.

President Ramachandran points out, persuasively, that the cost of including squash at the 2020 Olympics would be minimal, given that only two demountable glass show courts would be required, which could be suitably placed to highlight iconic locations in whichever city wins the Games from Istanbul, Madrid or Tokyo.

The game is also experimenting with glass floors to the courts which can be lit up to display statistics and even messages from sponsors.

Squash has been a core sport in the Commonwealth Games for the past 14 years

Squash has been part of the Commonwealth Games since 1998, and also features in the Asian, Pan American and All African Games.  In February the IOC will select one current Olympic sport to be dropped from the roster, and three months later a single sport will be recommended when the IOC membership makes its final decision in Buenos Aires next September.

Will squash finally be bounced in rather than out? Its rivals this time around are a varied bunch: sports climbing, karate, the Chinese martial art of wushu, a joint softball/baseball bid, roller sports and wakeboarding.

Whatever happens, it will be too late for the world's two leading male players – Britain's James Willstrop and Nick Matthew, both of whom will be adding their own efforts to World Squash Day – or for the pre-eminent women's champion Nicol David of Malaysia to harbour Olympic dreams.

Two questions are most pertinent when one considers the merits of a sport earning Olympic status. Firstly, how widespread is its appeal? Secondly, would the Olympics be regarded as the pinnacle achievement within the sport?

Many on that list of would-be Olympic sports fail on one or both counts – as indeed do some sports already safely on the Games roster. Squash ticks both boxes. QED.

Mike Rowbottom, one of Britain's most talented sportswriters, has covered the past five Summer and four Winter Olympics for The Independent. Previously he has worked for the Daily Mail, The Times, The Observer, the Sunday Correspondent and The Guardian. He is now chief feature writer for insidethegames. 

For those of us who worked on newspapers in Yorkshire during the sixties and seventies, revelations about Jimmy Savile are no shock.

Rumours of what the late disc jockey and television presenter was up to at the local Leeds Infirmary involving paedophilic sexual predatory – and worse – were vigorously pursued, but proving it was a no-no as lips were always tightly sealed.

Jim had fixed it so that no one dare say a word.

There are disturbing parallels with the Lance Armstrong doping scandal. Like the sleazy Savile and his protective shield of celebrity through massive charity fundraising, here was a seemingly untouchable icon, the All-American hero who had beaten cancer and repeatedly shown the world clean pair of wheels.

Clean? He had to be joking, as the 1,200-page tome of his cheating art produced by the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) now tells us.

There were whispers, innuendo, even allegations, but the Armstrong bike was so liberally Teflon-coated nothing could be made to stick. But, oh boy, it has now.

Sadly, though, that glorious summer of sport that so enthralled the world has black-clouded over.

Revelations of Lance Armstrong’s doping have left a dark cloud hanging over the cycling world

Along has come the ultimate dope peddler to put a spoke in sport's merrily spinning wheel of fortune.

I admit that cycling is not my bag, either journalistically or athletically.

I do not know enough about the sport to make widespread condemnation because of what we are now asked to believe about Armstrong and his stream of cover-up cohorts. But I know plenty who do.

But it is sufficient to know that more than 80 per cent of Tour de France winners since Britain's Tommy Simpson died in a doping-related incident on the slopes of Mont Ventoux during the 13th stage of the 1967 Tour have been associated with doping allegations and that the governing body, the International Cycling Union (UCI), has shown ostrich-like qualities in policing the sport until this bombshell of a report hauled heads from the sand, eyes blinking into the blinding sunlight of truth.

Now even it has to acknowledge that Armstrong for so long translated the Tour de France into the Tour de Farce.

The UCI elected to brush so much dirt under the carpet it has taken the USADA's industrial vacuum cleaner to suck it out.

Lord Leveson please note. As should those now oddly mute members of the Hackled Off group campaigning for press restrictions, among them Hugh Grant and Max Moseley.

For this could not have been done without good, honesty investigative journalism which put the scandal in the spotlight and kept it there.

The UCI launched court action against Paul Kimmage (C) for writing that it covered up a positive doping result for Lance Armstrong

David Walsh, of the Sunday Times, and erstwhile colleague Paul Kimmage have been relentless in their search for the truth.

Just as years ago we knew all about Savile, they were convinced Armstrong was at it, and were bold enough to say so.

They were vilified by those running the sport and for his pains Kimmage is still being sued in a Swiss court by the  UCI via its honorary life President Hein Verbruggen, who is also an honorary International Olympic Committee (IOC) member, and present head honcho Pat McQuaid, for defamation after claiming Armstrong "represented the cancer of doping" in the sport. Supporters have raised £30,000 ($43,000/€37,000) to pay for a defence that is surely now superfluous.

He rests his case.

There are calls, of course so far unheeded, for both Dutchman Verbruggen and Irishman McQuaid to quit for their unchallenging attitude towards Armstrong and all who rode with him on that illicit road to tarnished glory.

It certainly seems a resigning issue but sports Czars, like Government Ministers, are notoriously well practised in the art of avoiding falling swords.

USADA rightly says this is one of the most sordid chapters in sports history. Has there ever been a worse one? It can even be argued that so extensive was this tangled web of deceit that it dwarfs even the Ben Johnson episode at Seoul in 1988.

Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson was sent home from the Seoul Olympics in disgrace and stripped of his 100m gold after testing positive for drugs

Johnson cheated in pursuit of an Olympic gold medal; Armstrong rode for hard cash, the prize money for his seven Tour victories, and numerous others. That's not only cheating, isn't it fraud?

Doubts also must be cast over his own Olympic bronze; a situation the IOC is having to review.

Meantime, McQuaid has claimed that the UCI has nothing to apologise for, yet it has presided over a culture of doping in cycling that has existed since drugged-up Danish cyclist Knud Jensen died at the Rome 1960 Olympics through to the present day.

It is ironic that all this should blow up at a time when cycling in Britain has never been more popular both as a sport and a past-time thanks to the exploits of Sir Chris Hoy, Bradley Wiggins, Victoria Pendleton, Team Sky et al.

We trust in the unquestioned integrity of cycling supremo Dave Brailsford when he says that British riders are as clean as the proverbial whistle. But so endemic has doping been universally in the sport that, as with athletics, inevitably there is always that lurking suspicion that what we see is not always what we should believe.

British Cycling is under the microscope, and very much on the defensive.

After the golden moments of this year in the London 2012 Olympic Velodrome, the byways of Britain and the boulevards and mountains of France, it is the last thing it needs right now.

But such is the treacherous legacy of Lance.

Alan Hubbard is an award-winning sports columnist for The Independent on Sunday, and a former sports editor of The Observer. He has covered a total of 16 Summer and Winter Olympics, 10 Commonwealth Games, several football World Cups and world title fights from Atlanta to Zaire.

When historians look back and assess the success of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games there are obvious stand out moments that will resonate with everyone.

The lighting of the Olympic Flame by young people; the famous 45 minutes in the Olympic Stadium when Mo Farah, Jessica Ennis and Greg Rutherford struck gold for Team GB in track and field; David Weir's astonishing performances on the track and in the marathon.

These moments will last long in the memory, but for me there is something equally important that we should not forget.

Jessica Ennis proved one of the stars of the London 2012 Olympics as she won gold in the heptathlon

London 2012 worked.

From the smooth running transport networks, to the stunning sporting arenas and the fantastic Games Makers who made London 2012 such a friendly and welcoming occasion, everything went to plan.

When you consider the complexities of hosting the world's biggest sporting occasion this is no mean feat and I firmly put this down to the success of partnership working.

The Games saw major organisations working together for a common purpose on a scale never previously seen. And whilst it is important to celebrate the success of these partnerships to deliver the Games, it is imperative that we continue in the same spirit to deliver the promised Olympic legacy.

The London 2012 Games Makers have been widely credited for making the Olympic and Paralympic Games such a huge success

At the Youth Sport Trust one of our core values is partnership working and for many years we have worked with a range of organisations to improve the quality of sport in schools. We work with Government, corporate partners, NGB's, schools and young people themselves – groups that have a shared understanding of how sport can improve the lives of young people. As an individual organisation we cannot reach every school or every young person through our work – but by working in partnership with other organisations we can extend our reach and increase the impact of our work.

An example of this is the new partnership being developed between the Youth Sport Trust and the YMCA which I will be announcing today at the School Sport Conference in Kettering.

The YMCA is renowned for working with some of the most disadvantaged young people in society to achieve their full potential. We share an unwavering belief that health and physical activity are central to the wellbeing of all young people. Under this new partnership, we are planning to work across schools and local communities to help young people get and stay active.

Youth Sport Trust chair Baroness Sue Campbell has been one of the key figures in encouraging partnership at the top level in support of school sport

If we are to deliver an Olympic legacy we must continue to work together. Much of it must be led by partnership working at a national level and the Youth Sport Trust will play a key role in this moving forward. However, equally important is the need for organisations at a local level to work in collaboration in the delivery of school sport. Local schools, clubs, councils and coaches have a crucial role to play in improving school sports provision and making a real difference to the lives of young people.

We've had a fantastic party this summer – partnership working was one of the key ingredients that made it such a success and we must not forget that.

John Steele is the chief executive of the Youth Sport Trust.

Ten years ago today, Paula Radcliffe set her first world record in her second marathon – on the streets of Chicago.

For the British runner, victory in 2 hours 17min 18sec completed an annus mirabilis after so many years of narrow and excruciating failures. In the summer she had earned Commonwealth Games gold in Manchester, turning her 5,000 metres, effectively, into a series of laps of honour before an adoring, Union flag-waving crowd, before going on a week later to take the European 10,000m title in the driving rain of Munich.

The year had begun in triumph, too, as she had made her long-awaited move up to the marathon distance and won the London Marathon in 2:18:55, the world's best time for a women's only race and just eight seconds shy of the world record set by Kenya's Catherine Ndereba in the previous year's Chicago marathon.

Now, of course, we look back on Radcliffe's performance in the Windy City and see it in the context of her career. It was a huge step that would be followed by an even greater stride at the following year's London Marathon, where she won in 2:15:25, one of the all-time great athletics performances and a time which has still not even been approached by any other runner.

But let's not jump ahead of ourselves – because this first world record was not the certainty that it now appears, as the testimony of male runner who accompanied – but did not actively pace – Radcliffe in Chicago makes clear.

Writing in April 2003 on LetsRun.com, the outstanding website which he co-founded, Weldon Johnson (WeJo) – a top class US collegiate runner with realistic hopes of qualifying for the 2004 Olympics – detailed how he had been chosen by the Chicago Marathon race director Carey Pinkowski to serve as one of the "rabbits" for the elite women in what was, like so many other big City marathons, a mixed race.

Weldon Johnson "escorts" the pack during the Chicago Marathon, October 2002

On this occasion, however, Johnson and his handful of fellow pacers had been told by Pinkowski to scrupulously avoid the traditional pacing role of running ahead to lower wind resistance.

"We want you to run at the side [off camera] more as an escort to set a rhythm and to warn men runners that the convoy is coming through," Pinkowsi had written in an email.

"We want to stress the ESCORT nature rather than the pacing. Don't hand the lead women water or start running alongside, coaching and encouraging."

It was rabbit in the Chas & Dave sense which ultimately proved most helpful to Radcliffe as she strove to maintain the pace she needed on a day when the Windy City provided a stiff 20 miles per hour breeze into the face of runners over the first seven miles and the final four.


Runners race through Grant Park in downtown Chicago at the start of the 25th annual Chicago Marathon in 2002

"Radcliffe was in front of the women's race the entire way," Johnson wrote. "But Catherine Ndereba and Yoku Shibui of Japan were in the back of the pack that surrounded Paula.

"As time went on, more and more men fell from the pack, but both Ndereba and Shibui hung close to Radcliffe, well under world record pace. I'm not sure if Radcliffe ever knew they were there because not once the entire race did she ever look back."

Right there was the mark of the champion. Radcliffe was locked onto her target like a laser-guided missile.

By the 16th mile Radcliffe was moving clear of her nearest female challenger, and by 18 miles Ndereba was 20 seconds down.

"Paula was pouring it on during the final miles of the race," Johnson recalled. "If the second half of the marathon really begins at mile 20 then Paula was in great shape as she ran 5min 09.8sec and 5:11.6 for the 21st and 22nd miles.

Paula Radcliffe celebrates as she crosses the finish line in record time in the 2002 Chicago Marathon

"I had originally only planned on going 20 miles with the leader, but I felt good at that point and wanted to make sure Paula got the world record....However, I had forgotten one thing, the wind. It had been mostly at our back since mile seven. At the start of mile 23 we made a turn to head north for home and the wind hit us straight in the face. The running got considerably tougher now, and I'm not sure what I was thinking except how difficult it was. I knew in the back of my head it would be perfectly legal under IAAF rules to get right in front of Paula and help her break the wind. But the race had stressed to us our role as escorts...

"Paula asked me what the split for the 23rd mile was and I looked at my watch and said '5:23', thinking that was a perfectly reasonable amount to slow down running into a 15 or 20 miles an hour wind. I was caught by surprise by Paula's reaction. 'Whaaat', she yelled, definitely upset. I guess slowing down is not in the cards when you're Paula Radcliffe. She proceeded to put down her head and push the pace down faster, running 5:09 for the next mile with much of it into the same killer headwind. It was truly incredible (and painful if you ask me)...

Paula Radcliffe hugs defending marathon champion Catherine Ndereba of Kenya

"Once we hit the 25-mile marker I started jogging with a big smile on my face. My job was done, Paula would smash the record, and I could enjoy the final mile...

"I had seen at first-hand what an amazing athlete Paula is, but also her complete dedication (and I mean total dedication that I believe no other athlete in the world has) to the sport.

"It's hard to believe, but a year ago this week before Paula had won the London marathon she was regarded as a gallant loser by all of Britain...

"She might throw caution to the wind and really go for it in London..."

Johnson's prediction on the eve of the 2003 London Marathon proved correct. Radcliffe did go for it. But her feat in Chicago, rounding off a year of success, established her at a new level in the sport.

The British papers were full of her achievements. Tom Knight, in the Daily Telegraph, hailed Radcliffe as "one of the giants of long-distance running." Some character named Mike Rowbottom wrote in The Independent: "There is no question now that 2002 will always be remembered as an annus mirabilis for the runner. But even that description underplays the intensity of Radcliffe's performances - it has taken her less than seven months to compile a sequence of wins unparalleled in women's athletics." Another character named Duncan Mackay wrote in The Guardian: "Even in the greatest year any female athlete has put together, 28-year-old Radcliffe was truly awesome. What was supposed to be a head-to-head between her and Ndereba was in fact Radcliffe against the clock..."

Paula Radcliffe holds up her first place trophy after winning the Chicago Marathon with a new world record of 2:17:18

Pat Butcher, writing in the Financial Times, commented: "Combined with her runaway London marathon, Commonwealth Games and European Championships titles, the record puts Radcliffe in a stratosphere unoccupied by a British athlete since the days of Sebastian Coe and Steve Ovett in the 1980s."

The Chicago Tribune's Skip Myslenski wrote: "She had travelled here intent on breaking the world record and went after it relentlessly, undeterred by the wind or the cold or the threat of two-time defending champion Catherine Ndereba of Kenya. From the start Radcliffe resembled a predator stalking helpless prey, and like a well-oiled metronome she ticked off miles that kept the record within her reach."

And in the Daily Mail, Neil Wilson looked ahead. "The possibility is growing," Wilson wrote, "that the encore to her world record will start at the Greek town of Marathon, which gave the event its name, in August 2004 at the Olympic Games."

Oh dear. Now we really are jumping ahead of ourselves.

Mike Rowbottom, one of Britain's most talented sportswriters, has covered the past five Summer and four Winter Olympics for The Independent. Previously he has worked for the Daily Mail, The Times, The Observer, the Sunday Correspondent and The Guardian. He is now chief feature writer for insidethegames.

We're off again! The HSBC Sevens World Series starts up this weekend after a break of four months, and what a busy four months that has been. We won the three-tournament European GP Series, coach Russell Earnshaw led a GB Students side to the World Universities title and our programme has expanded as we drive standards higher.

19 young men in England are now full-time international sevens players and 12 of them play this weekend on the Gold Coast in round one of nine. Competition is high for selection and it's been well documented how fit and strong our squad are.

But it won't win you tournaments if you get out there, look great in the tight shirts and then run around without a clue. The fitness, speed and sheer athleticism of our players often gets top billing on any news coming out of the camp but it only tells a small part of our story.

Let's be straightforward about this: our professional players these days, to be the best, need to get their conditioning and their nutrition spot on. They won't be seen rolling out of late-night bars or burger joints because, frankly, they no longer live that lifestyle.

All the stuff we do to get them in great shape comes from doing the simple things well; measuring and managing them and understanding individual nuances through data and experience. I would expect all the other rival teams to have ticked those boxes as well as we have.

England Sevens team in action during practice at The Lensbury Club in Teddington

The difference in sides winning or losing at the very top of the international game comes down to execution if their strategy is right. Many teams we play against have a similar formula.

In attack they stretch teams to effectively disconnect defenders and find space. In defence they try to stay connected as a team and force errors or lead teams into areas in which they feel confident they will turn the ball over. Success relies on them executing their strategies and hoping they are the right ones!

With England we have a style we have worked hard on and that needs to be executed against all the teams consistently to bring us success. It's my job and Russell's job to make sure the way we approach the game stands up to whatever is thrown at it and the players all understand how to play it. It's a great challenge.

It is also about understanding your players, working out how they like to learn, and what helps them get the best out of each other. Then that needs to shared among the players so they all know as much as they can about each other.

All this is designed to make the team run as well as possible and it's a process you have to invest time in to turn a great team of players into a team that is great. This week, until we kick off tomorrow, the players will run the sessions we have planned.

Ben Ryan says his team is "well prepared" for the tournament

I love watching the team run a practice session as I (metaphorically at least), get in my helicopter to look at the bigger picture from above.

It's certainly an exciting time for everyone supporting and connected to England Sevens. The lads are well prepared for the Gold Coast Sevens as are all the squad and management for the year ahead.

We have all sat and cheered in awe at the brilliant performances throughout a dramatic summer of sport back home and now it's time for us to get up and get going. Come on England!

Ben Ryan is head coach for England Sevens, who will be playing in the HSBC Sevens World Series starting on Saturday (October 13) in the Gold Coast, Australia.