The London Games will be designed for the athletes and we will provide them with the very best venues and the very best conditions to pursue their sporting dreams in London.

Sport and the needs of athletes are central to London's plans for the Games, and I know that Jonathan will continue to represent these views energetically.

We have to recognise there are very few countries you will take the Games to where somebody doesn't have issues on foreign or domestic policy.

I started track and field when I was 12 and didn't get to an Olympic Games until I was nearly 23. By any stretch of the imagination that's a very long apprenticeship.

I will go to my grave believing that participation is best driven by the well-stocked shop window.

Since the break-up of the 1990s, Russia has not had winter sports facilities. All the winter sport venues were effectively located in countries that are no longer part of the federation. There is a strong argument for saying Sochi's legacy will be this country will have winter sports facilities it did not have before.