There are some who finish on the immense high of an Olympic gold, there are many more whose last moment of being an international athlete might be losing a selection trial, or finally giving up the battle against injury one morning in March.

Steve Redgrave is a name that will forever be associated with Olympic glory. Alison Knowles and Hester Goodsell were not names that even made it on to the Team GB list this summer, as both retired in the spring after winters blighted by illness and injury.

Everybody dreams of the fairytale ending but only a tiny number of people actually achieve it.

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Which is why I decided that I was going to take control of the final act of my rowing career by organising an event in Cornwall after the Games to bring together Olympic rowing and gig rowing - big heavy wooden boats with fixed seats which row in the open sea.

I persuaded 11 Team GB rowers - Helen, Heather, Melanie, Beth, Frances, Sophie, Lou, Jess, Rosamund and Katherine - down to Cornwall for a series of races in gigs. For the last six months, and especially the seven weeks after the Games, the 'Cornish Rowing Challenge' took over my life.

It was a hugely emotional evening for me, just a few miles away from where I first learnt to row on the River Fowey. I'd put so much work into it and it went exactly as I'd dreamed.

The stats stack up well: 2,500 spectators, several thousand pounds raised for charity, front page of the main regional paper, live coverage on both regional TV evening news as well as a live national broadcast on The One Show.

I couldn't have chosen a better way to row the last few strokes of my career. My family have always found my rowing very stressful because although they're immensely proud of me, they also see how much pressure I've been under and how much it can rip me apart.

They've spent the last eight years travelling round Europe to hot, barren lakes on the outskirts of foreign cities to watch me race in the distance and it's an environment they've never enjoyed, so it was also really important that they could come down to St Mawes and share the final chapter with me.

I then stepped back into normality.

First impressions? It's life - but not as we know it. Life as a full-time athlete is one of extremes as you push mind, body and soul to the absolute limit.

My life now is therefore pretty odd because everything has changed. Every tiny detail.

Energy levels:

Then - exhausted, lethargic, constant need to sit down or preferably to sleep, at any time of the day. The kind of deep, bone-aching tiredness where simply going to the supermarket becomes a struggle and staying awake is problematic - missing my stop on the train was a regular occurrence. Anything less than nine hours' sleep and I was useless the next day.

Now - six hours a night and I'm bright and breezy! And if I'm a bit knackered after a busy day - well, it's nothing that an early night or a coffee in the morning won't fix!

Appetite:

Then - the word 'hungry' doesn't even cover it. Endurance athletes will know that after a big session, you're so hungry that you feel like your body is starting to devour itself from the inside, and if you don't eat something substantial, right now, you might pass out. Sometimes a massive meal won't even touch the sides. I'd often eat a huge plate and then have toast for pudding.

Now - if I get a bit peckish, the feeling will often go away on its own. Failing that, a cuppa or some fruit fills me right up.

Body shape:

Then - see my previous blog on this subject. Big shoulders, big quads and callouses on our hands that can rip a pashmina to pieces (and I simply CANNOT live without a pashmina, darling).

Now - My shoulders, arms and quads are slowly deflating, and I can wear rings on my fingers again after eight years of being unable to squeeze them over callouses.

Drugs testing:

Then - a daily requirement to inform UK Anti-Doping of my location under the 'Whereabouts' rules, so they could test me whenever they wished, was a constant source of stress and it's only now I can appreciate how much it was on my mind. Early morning or late night noises that sounded anything like a knock at the door had me jumping out of bed to rush downstairs to see if it was the testers, because failing to hear them at the door counted as a missed test, and three missed tests would have automatically meant the humiliation of a life ban.

Now - I don't need to tell anyone where I am! When I'm on holiday I no longer have to text in regular updates! I'm free! This has without a doubt been the most joyous change to my life, and I didn't realise how much 'Whereabouts' was constantly on my mind until it was taken away.

Of course, I'm focusing on the extremes of the bad bits about being a full-time athlete. Being tired, stressed and hungry all the time are things I won't miss about rowing, but at the same time that feeling of always working towards a goal, and being part of a mission, is hard to let go of.

I have spent the last eight years in the company of a group of ambitious, passionate women who are great fun to be around and are some of the best in the world at their job.

Whatever I do next, however rewarding it may be, will never allow me again to say that I spend every day working towards my dreams.

The logical part of my brain tells me I have got so much to be proud of. I am a two-time Olympian, part of an elite group. I won a silver medal at the 2008 Games in Beijing and have stood on the podium at three World Championships since then.

To then represent my country at a home Olympics is an indescribable honour. However, the emotional part of my brain leaves me feeling confused about London 2012.

How should I feel about coming fifth in the final of the women's eight? How should I feel about all that has happened in the last eight years, the incredible highs and horrific lows?

GB's women's eight finish fifth in the Olympic final at London 2012. Pic: Getty 

It has taken me a while to work out what the Olympics mean to me. It will mean something different to the journalists writing about it, to the country at large, to the organising committee, and to family and friends of the competitors. And particularly to the athletes, those who achieved what they had dreamed and those who did not.

In 2008, there was the crushing disappointment of being in a boat that staked everything on winning gold, but came away with silver, a result that absolutely ripped me apart. In 2012, I was part of a crew that promised so much more than fifth.

It is easy to stand on the middle step of the podium, gold medal round your neck, and think it was all worth it. What happens to those who come away from the Games feeling like a failure? How do I begin to relate to this behemoth called the Olympics?

Having spent most of the last two weeks since the Games with a montage of my entire rowing career constantly running through my head, I think I am beginning to understand.

It comes down to one very simple answer: it's sport. Sport can be a cruel mistress. It will chew you up and spit you out, but it's sport. It is irrational, it gets under your skin and takes you over, but it's sport. It means the world to you, but it's still only sport.

I love sport, I really do. I love the fact it gives you the opportunity, at any level, to truly express yourself. I can put my heart and soul into my rowing and I can turn myself inside out to be the best I can be, irrespective of the outcome. I can work with a team of committed, driven, passionate people in pursuit of our dreams and we can create something really special together, something we will remember for the rest of our lives.

The cruel side of sport is that the person who comes first and the person who comes last put in the same commitment, make the same sacrifices and experience the same emotional rollercoaster, but to the victor the spoils. One person gets their moment on top of the podium, the other goes home with nothing.

That is another reason I love sport so much. I love the people who are brave enough to gamble it all, to put their entire life into one thing, racing a boat, knowing that only a very small number of people get the fairytale ending. I love the people who are prepared to put mind, body and soul into something with absolutely no guarantee of success.

You will not meet a group of people more passionately committed to representing their country and wearing the union jack with pride - and, in my case, the Cornish flag - than the women who make up the British rowing team. I feel immensely privileged to have been a part of it for eight years.

So how do I process all the highs and lows of my career? With that one word: sport.

I know I have never stepped away from a challenge, never been afraid to fail and never, ever accepted second best from myself. I have rowed with some brilliant, inspirational, nutty people and I have got some magical memories that I will take to my grave.

There is so, so much more to this last four years than the number five. Actually, finishing fifth is the least important part of it all. It will take some time to be able to realise all this and to accept it, because right now it is raw and it hurts. I have got a few plans for the next few months and then reality beckons.

At the risk of using a cliche, I will finish with the Olympic motto, which is something I held on to after the crushing disappointment of Beijing...

"The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle. The essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well."

We transfer to Dorney Lake early next week with the Olympic regatta starting on Saturday morning.

The heats for the women's eight are scheduled to start the day after that, which leaves us the best part of a week before battle commences.

What we're trying to do out here is absolutely not to come up with a performance that will win us the Olympics.

What we're trying to do is to come up with a robust, repeatable, predictable performance than we have 101% confidence in; then take that to Dorney and race the hell out of it.

The thing to remember is that at all big events, World Championships and Olympic Games, the standard of sport will be incredibly high right across the board, and all the athletes will all be incredibly talented and in the form of their lives.

What makes the difference, then? Quite simply - the ability of the people involved to get it right on the day.

It's about being able to sink the crucial putt when the Open depends on it; Jonny Wilkinson kicking the drop goal with seconds of the World Cup final remaining; Roger Federer landing an ace when he's match-point down.

You don't win major championships by rowing well - that's a given. All the crews row well. You win major championships by being tough, gutsy, and having nerves of steel.

The Olympic Games are a pressure cooker, and it becomes less about rowing and more about character, and how we as people will react to the atmosphere of the Olympic cauldron.

It's not the rowing which will win it - it will be the crew that grabs the six-minute window of opportunity with both hands and doesn't let go. We know that Olympic medals are decided by a few hundredths of a second - an inch or two - so there will literally be the blink of an eye that separates the euphoric joy of success, from the crushing disappointment of failure.

And there's no second chance. The result we get at our Olympic regatta will live with us for the rest of our lives.

From my own experience in Beijing, where I was part of the quad, I'd put my heart, body and soul into winning gold, so when we came away with silver I was left with the bitter, wrenching, shocking disbelief of failure which has stayed with me ever since.

So the purpose of all the work we're doing at the moment is to remove the possibility that we'll underperform, and instead establish a platform from which we can fight the rest of the world.

We've done the hard yards, we've done the planning, talking, and ironing out of inconsistencies, so that we can sit on that start line in August with the only unknown being how far we can reach into the depths of our souls to find a performance of which we never knew we were capable.

It's not like writing names on a team sheet and that being the end of it. Within the team there are still a number of selection decisions to make, including for my own crew, and I've been named in a squad of 10 for the women's eight and the spare pair.

Going through the whole experience four years ago, when I was selected in the quad scull and ended up with a silver medal, has taught me some lessons.

Annabel Vernon (second from right) made her international debut in the eight in Lucerne (Picture: Getty)

On the one hand, becoming an Olympian is an indescribable feeling because it encompasses not just sporting ability, but also those Corinthian ideals of equality and achievement. Whether a British rower, a Kenyan marathon runner or a Hungarian weightlifter, all compete equally with equal respect for each other and all are there in pursuit of the Olympic ideals of "Citius, Altius, Fortius".

At the same time, however, I'm not aiming for the Olympics for any reason other than to be a part of a very fast British women's eight and to see how fast we can make that eight go.

But back to the here and now. Following the team announcement, we've returned to the coalface to continue our preparation for the third of the three-regatta World Cup series, in Munich next weekend.

Unlike the mainstream sports which play matches weekly, we have only a few events every year in which to test ourselves before the World Championships or Olympic Games, meaning there's far less room for error. Of course we practise racing against each other within the British team, but nothing can truly prepare for the international stage.

The second World Cup, in the Swiss town of Lucerne two weeks ago, held some interesting challenges as I made my international debut in the women's eight, meaning I've moved from two oars (sculling) to one oar (sweep).

This transfer is perhaps similar to the differences between water-skiiing and wakeboarding, and it didn't take long to feel comfortable in this slightly different movement. A greater challenge than moving from two oars to one, though, was moving from small boats to the Tyrannasaurus Rex of rowing, the big daddy ... the eight.

What stands out is simply the sheer number of people involved: eight tall, opinionated, confident women, shepherded in our case by Ealing's finest cox, Caroline O'Connor.

There is a huge amount of energy created and the challenge is to channel that energy into perfect synchronicity, in a racing environment which is the noisiest, the most aggressive, the fastest and most furious of all the different boat types.

In the pair, Helen Glover is able to whisper into Heather Stanning's ear in order to coax more effort out of her; if a cox needs more speed she'll scream at the top of her voice down her microphone to reach the bow pair who are 50 foot away from her.

However, representing your country at an international sporting event is a pretty awesome experience in whatever boat class and from my first regatta wearing a Union flag (Amsterdam, 2004) it was an environment that I immediately loved and felt at home in.

Along with the physical effort required, I loved the mental game of performing to my best on the day and going out to test myself against the best in the world. In the quad in 2007-8, for example, I was pitched against the legendary German sculler Kathrin Boron, and I relished having the opportunity of racing one of the most successful rowers ever.

I think that's one of the main attractions of the Olympics - as athletes we strive to be the best, and for that fortnight every four years not only will I be at my best, but so will all my competitors.

Representing my country at sport is something I will never take for granted and every chance I have to wear the Union flag is a huge honour.

And getting to sit on an international start line, hands resting on your oar handle, eyes fixed on the starting light, muscles fizzing with anticipation, is unmatchable.

There will be plenty of updates in the weeks and months to come on how training is going, the battle for selection and the increasing excitement as we get closer and closer to an Olympic Games on home soil.

However, this month I thought I'd give you a more personal insight into what it's really like to row for your country, warts and all. Here are the bits that nobody ever seems to consider.....

Anna Watkins attempting to get rid of her 'racer back' tan lines

Sense of humour. One of our best coping strategies for the daily process of driving yourself to exhaustion and beyond is humour. There aren't many situations that are beyond a chuckle and I think rowers are excellent at finding the funny side of every event. Rower with the Best Ability To Crack Jokes? That would be Jessica Eddie, whose Geordie irony can make anyone smile.

Music. When it comes to long stints on the rowing machines, or ergos, what's on our MP3 player is absolutely crucial and hence we spend hours compiling playlists, meticulously planned to ensure the best songs come on during the darkest moments of the session. The award for the Most Interesting Choice Of Music goes to Beth Rodford, who believes the best album to see you through a long ergo is the soundtrack to Joseph and his Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat.

Boyfriends. They must satisfy two non-negotiable criteria. First, they must be tall. Certainly taller than us (including when we're in heels), and that means at least 6ft 4ins. And heavier, obviously. Second, they must be secure enough to cope with their girlfriends being better at sport than they are, and possibly having bigger muscles. Winner of Boyfriend Who Doesn't Mind Being Beaten By A Girl is Lindsey Maguire's partner, who not only has a girlfriend better at sport than he but also a sister - Hannah England, the GB 1500m runner.

Getting clothes to fit. I remember, years ago, that I was a standard size 12. Now, however, it's a different story. The fact that I'm a lot slimmer, which is great, is counter-balanced by the fact I've got muscle definition around my body. Jeans that are long enough and not too tight around the quads are invariably too big round the waist. Tops that can accommodate my shoulders are baggy around the stomach. What is a girl to do? Rower Who Dresses the Best: Vicky Thornley, resident glamour puss.

If you're happy and you know it... The ability to be in a ridiculously good mood first thing in the morning is another defining feature of our lives. Rowing is a sport that requires participants to be up at dawn or beforehand, and having grown up on a farm, that suits me fine. The award for Most Consistently Cheerful In The Morning goes to Captain Heather Stanning, who always has a smile, clearly relishing the mornings before she goes back to her previous career of waking up in a foxhole on Salisbury Plain with the Royal Artillery.

Tan lines. Less of a problem this time of year, but still, spending so much time in the outdoors means that despite being religious in our adherence to suntan lotion, we still end up with some interesting looking lines. Glaringly white feet and bodies contrast to nut brown legs and arms, which look fine until we're on our holidays in bikinis. The award for Biggest Commitment To Skin Tone goes to Anna Watkins, who spent the entire summer of 2009 switching between different strappy tops every day in order to even out the brown shade across her shoulders and back. She did have a good reason though: her own wedding, a fortnight after the World Championships. Rumours she hit the sunbed after getting back from Poznan are unsubstantiated.

There are some fairly odd upsides and downsides of this unique lifestyle but I hope I've managed to throw some light on both sides. I'm back off now to my regular training regime, best summed up by describing it as all day, every day, many thousands of calories and a surfeit of chapped skin on my hands.

It's a month until our national team trials on the Olympic course at Dorney Lake, near Slough, so the focus now is on getting my single scull up and running. I'll let you know how I get on.

I put that right on a beautiful, still, late summer's evening in the estuary at Falmouth, which made a welcome change from the normally freezing mornings and biting winds when training with the GB squad on the Thames.

The scene was only enhanced by the wooden pilot gigs, each one named and painted in bright colours, and they really are beautiful constructions compared to the forgettable yellow and black plastic German-made shells that we race in.

The pilot gigs make for a spectacular scene at Falmouth. Photo: gigrower.co.uk

Cornish pilot gigs date back to the days of sail, when large ships attempted to wind their way into the dangerous ports in Cornwall and the Scilly Isles and needed someone with local knowledge and experience in navigation.

The licensed Trinity House pilots had crewed boats to row them out to the incoming ships and, when one was spotted on the horizon, there was often a race to get out to it as the first crew there would get the pilotage fee. Hence rowing races were born, and the first Oxford-Cambridge Boat Race took place in a pair of pilot gigs.

According to my grandfather, a Trinity House pilot in north Cornwall in the 1970s and 1980s, another important duty when returning to Padstow having navigated a ship back out to sea around Trevose Head was to collect any of the local women still on board entertaining the sailors and take them back to town. But I digress.

When I was growing up gig clubs were thin on the ground but in the last 20 years the sport has expanded hugely in the Scilly Isles, west country and the south coast of England. Gig rowing can now even be found in the US, France, the Netherlands and the Faroe Islands. The most recent World Championships (held annually in the Scilly Isles in May) were attended by nearly 2,000 rowers and over 120 boats - equally split between men's and women's crews.

So on our recent break following the World Championships, I was invited down to Flushing and Mylor Pilot Gig Club by a friend to finally have a go at our home-grown sport.

Getting the gig into the water is the first major test. Photo: gigrower.co.uk

Gigs are crewed by six rowers plus cox, so the seven of us set to getting the boat into the water off the beach. And that was the first stumbling block. Sliding-seat rowing boats are carbon fibre and weigh between 14kg (for a single scull) and 96kg (for an eight). You can carry them on your shoulders between three or four of you without too much effort. The gigs, by contrast, are solid wood with thick planks for the decking and thwarts and took rollers and trolleys to get them into the water.

The good ship 'Penarrow' afloat, we next turned to the oars. The carbon fibre oars I'm used to weigh a few pounds in total and are stiff and aerodynamic. In Falmouth, my skills were swiftly put to shame as I was handed a heavy wooden oar with just a strip of leather around the part which rested against the rowlock. And when I say rowlock, I mean two pins set into the side of the boat, with nothing to stop it sliding laterally away from me, or up and out of the boat into the sea.

My early efforts were pretty pathetic as I kept losing control of the oar so it would just slip off the side of the boat, leaving yours truly lamely clinging on to the handle so as not to lose it (as well as my dignity) altogether.

The rest of the crew, all experienced gig rowers, in between gales of laughter gave me lots of tips to improve and gig rowing seemed to me to be just as technical as sliding-seat rowing, with the same buzz out of those moments when it comes together and the crew is working in harmony.

Despite the seats being fixed benches, my impression was that a lot of the technique is transferable between the two types of rowing and you certainly use your legs to move the boat much more than I'd imagined. Racing is of course very different - we would never have to cope with four foot sea swells as the gig rowers do, or execute 180 degree turns around race buoys.

We could share tales of calloused hands and chafed bottoms, though. Solidarity.

The job is not quite finished once the boat is brought back to shore

Thanks to the ladies of Flushing & Mylor Pilot Gig Club who made me very welcome and didn't laugh too loudly at my fairly rustic efforts. I will certainly be banging the drum for gig rowing in the future - what a great sport, and a huge part of our proud Cornish seafaring tradition.

I could have written a blog last year entitled "winning". This year, sadly, it is the opposite. I'm not going to sit and whinge about this being the worst result for my boat - the women's quadruple scull - since so and so, or my worst result since such and such.
This is not a list of statistics or a reeling off of clichés: this is a description of what it is like to lose, and how you deal with it.

The times and the race reports are available elsewhere - in essence, at this World Championships in Bled, Slovenia, we came third in a close race in our heat and thus had to race a repechage to attempt to reach the final. Again in the rep we came third in a close race and ended up having to contest the B-final for positions seven to 12 overall, with only one slot available to qualify a boat for the Olympics next year.

So in the space of five days we went from having high hopes of defending the world title we won in New Zealand last year, to having to scrap to gain the last Olympic qualifying spot and then to sit on the river bank to watch the Germans cross the line first in the A final, whooping and cheering.

I don't believe that anyone has a right to a gold, or deserves a medal, or is destined to achieve a childhood dream. I think sport is a brutal, cruel, ruthless business.

There's no magical quality or mythical element that separates winners from losers (as many sports journalists like to write). It's a question of who can be the most brutal, the most cruel, and the most ruthless and by hook or by crook get their boat across the finish line first.

There's no element of luck even in the close races: New Zealand's Evers-Swindell twins, who won three world and two Olympic titles together, were involved in photo finishes three years running: 2006, 2007 and 2008. Guess who got the verdict on every occasion?

The period between the repechage and the B-final was without a doubt the toughest 48 hour period of my rowing career. We had to pick ourselves up from the most crushing of disappointments on Tuesday to be back in a place where we could win on Thursday. Not qualifying for London 2012 was out of the question.

And by pick ourselves up, I don't just mean physically, but emotionally too. We were all in pieces after the rep yet we had to get ourselves into a place where we were excited about creating a special performance, not dwelling on the absolute necessity of winning. We had to find a winning mentality out of the wreckage of our Worlds campaign, even though we all wanted to walk away.

I was lucky to have my family out there with me and they were superb in cheering me up. Elise Laverick - a long-time member of the GB squad an Olympic bronze medallist in Beijing before she retired - emailed me after the rep with some words of advice and confidence.

Elise is one of the fiercest competitors I've ever raced with, and having her perspective was invaluable in helping me to re-focus on the task at hand.

So what have I gained from the experience? Three things. Firstly, I left Bled with a greater appreciation of the fine line between success and failure, but at the same time the huge effort that is required to bridge that line.

Secondly, my respect for my crew-mates Debbie, Beth and Melanie has gone up and up, because of the way we were able to come together to turn things around.

Thirdly and most importantly, I've strengthened my belief in the one fundamental of sport being the principle that whatever happens, however high you rise or low you fall, whatever life throws at you, whatever situation you are confronted by, however good or bad you feel, you never give up.

The outcome that is at stake is irrelevant. You put your pride on the end of the oar and you give everything, whether there's an Olympic gold on the line or whether it's a winter training session.

I think Rudyard Kipling puts it best in his famous poem If.

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the will which says to them, 'Hold On!'

You never give up and you never stop fighting. Ever.

B: Blisters. These initially cause problems for the novice rower's hands, but later turn into calluses, which are more unsightly but also more practical. Being from a farming background, I don't mind being a horny-handed daughter of the soil; but my goodness calluses don't half rip holes in tights and pashminas.

GB rowers spend two to three hours a week on the ergometer

C: Coaches. This is the collection of middle-aged men from around the world who tell us what to do - from sarcastic Australians, to no-nonsense northerners. But of course, as a woman, we don't mind being told what to do by men, do we?

D: Dreams. This is going to soundly cheesy, but I personally think the best thing about being an international athlete is that I'm constantly working towards my dreams.

My dream is to go to the Olympics and win, and I'm doing everything in my power, as part of a squad of similarly determined and passionate women, guided by a team of coaches and sports scientists all experts in their field, to achieve that. What could be better than that?

E: Ergo. "Cogito ergo sum," said Descartes - "I think, therefore I am". "Ergo, ergo sum," reply rowers who spend two to three hours a week on "ergometer" rowing machines. Coaches love these grey machines because they can see the numbers and they know exactly how hard you're working. "Ergs don't float," we grumble in response.

F: With apologies to my Mum, sometimes in sport, no other word will do.

G: Going out. Not something that we do every often as we fight a constant battle against overwhelming tiredness (see T), and are thus tucked up in bed by 9 or 10 o'clock most evenings. Which is ironic, really, because many of us first started rowing because at university the rowers had the best social lives. Nowadays, we are the ultimate binge drinkers: we don't drink for months on end then have one almighty night out after the World Championships.

GB womens' squad sport their formal Team GB Olympic outfits in Beijing

H: Henley Royal Regatta. Ah, Hen-lah. The showpiece of British rowing. The standard of international racing very much depends on which countries choose to include it in their summer racing schedule, but for club rowers it is the pinnacle of achievement. Everyone wants to either win or get knocked out on the first day so they can don their blazer and drink Pimm's for the remaining days. Therefore, everyone's a winner at Henley.

I: Interviews. Is it possible to give a sporting interview without slipping into clichés? You try to avoid them, but suddenly you find yourself saying that at the end of the day, you're going to go out and give it your best, and it was a race of two halves, and ...

J: JDI (Just Do It). This is what sport comes down to in its simplest form. You can over-analyse your technique, you can use cutting-edge technology, you can bring in experts in all sorts of things; but sport at its essence is not complicated. Whether it's getting your boat across the finish line first, or indeed kicking a ball into a net, or repeatedly hitting a cricket ball over a boundary rope; be simple and be ruthless. JDI.

K: Kit. Rowing kit evolved from the classic PE kit of shirt and shorts, but whereas other athletes now wear clothes which can look good or be flattering (tennis dresses, rugby shirts, cricket whites), rowing has evolved the other way, becoming less and less flattering, especially for the womenfolk. Tight, shiny lycra, revealing all of one's lumps, bumps and sweat patches. Coming to a catwalk near you soon!

L: Lakes. Many hours ploughing up and down lakes around the world can be repetitive, but putting in perhaps 30 laps a week on the stunning Lake Bled in Slovenia (where the World Championships take place at the end of this month), Lake Varese in Italy (where we are on training camp for the next few weeks) or the Rotsee at Lucerne is surely far preferable to following the bottom of a swimming pool, or the black line in a velodrome. Count your blessings.

M: MTFU. Another acronym, often shortened to merely "Man Up". I'm not sure what the feminists of the 1970s and '80s would have made of this saying, which is in very common usage in the GB women's squad but we can be sure of one thing: Maggie Thatcher would approve.

N: Nutrition. Quality and quantity (3-4,000 calories a day for openweight women - up to twice the recommended daily amount) is the key here, all washed down with copious amounts of sugary electrolyte drinks. Just wait until we retire and you can bet that we're all going to pile on the pounds.

O: Olympics, predictably. See my previous blog on this subject.

P: Pain. I could write a PhD on this. There are many different kinds of pain: the my-legs-are-burning-my-lungs-are-screaming pain; the everything-is-tightening-up-and-I-can't-see-anymore pain; or the I-want-to-climb-out-out-of-my-skin-because-my-entire-body-is-killing-me pain when you've just crossed the line in a race. It is your constant companion in rowing. However, as the saying goes, pain is temporary but glory is forever!

Q: Quadruple scull. The boat in which I've won three of my four World Championship medals thus far (and one of the six different boat types used at Olympic level). A quad is a relatively small hull for a lot of power and energy, so the trick is to learn how to blend the power with finesse, precision and timing. When you get it just right, the boat flies.

R: Rib. The most common of rowing injuries is the rib stress fracture, which I've been fortunate enough to avoid. With several hundred watts going through your body every stroke, tremendous pressure is put on your torso in a repetitive manner, thousands of times a day for years and years.

S: Sweat. We've trained in some pretty warm environments over the years but nothing compares to Gifu, where we contested the World Championships in 2005, when the entire team of 50 or so athletes were erging in a hall with no ventilation, in the humidity of Japan. I think there was more sweat than floor by the end. Nice!

T: Training programme. The Excel spreadsheet emailed out to us periodically by the coaches, detailing minutes per day to be devoted to each training zone or activity (weights, trunk conditioning, etc), is the Bible to us. Rowers divide into two groups: those who study it avidly weeks in advance, can always remember the schedule for the day, and can always produce the session's required rates, split times or distances upon request; and those who believe that ignorance is bliss.

U: UT2. This is the name given to the training threshold at which we do probably 90% of our training. Heart rate roughly between 150-170, rate 18-20 strokes per minute, just get your head down and bash it out. Getting tired or bored? See 'M'.

Annabel and her mum - the least sporty woman in Cornwall

W: Weights, or "strength and conditioning" as the coaches prefer. The classic idea that people have of weight training is something along the lines of Arnie or Rocky, bashing out a montage of bench presses to the music of some power ballad from the 1980s. The reality is a bit more mundane. S&C not only increases our power and strength but can rehab injuries or niggles, correct imbalances and increase our flexibility and core strength to assist with injury prevention. But yes, we do still sometimes put on the Rocky soundtrack.

X: eXhaustion. Just as the Eskimos apparently have over a hundred words for snow, I could probably think of a hundred different ways of being tired. Training for 30 hours a week or thereabouts is essentially a constant process of getting tired and recovering, getting tired and recovering, and so on. There's walking-up-stairs tired, falling-asleep-everywhere tired, generally-a-bit-grumpy tired, counting-strokes-on-an-ergo tired, losing-your-sense-of-humour tired ...

Y: Why do we do it? See the entry for 'D' and this should give you some idea. Ultimately I think one has to refer to George Mallory, with his famous reply when asked why he wanted to climb Everest, "because it's there". Why do I want to go to the Olympics? Because it's there.

Z: Zzzzz. Sleep? Not a problem. Anywhere, anytime, any day, I can pretty much fall asleep on request. I think 'training induced narcolepsy' should be a recognized medical condition.

Feel free to write in with comments or alternative ideas. Having just completed a training camp in Germany, we're now off to Italy to make final preparations for the World Championships in Bled in September.

Our cycling training camp in Majorca could be summed up in two words: "seriously" and "hard".

We were out there for two weeks training on bikes which, as well as giving us a break from the boats, also gives us a different kind of benefit. Rowing is an all-body exercise so you are limited to how long you can train for by how your back and core muscles hold up; cycling only uses your legs so you can go for much longer.

Our standard endurance rowing session is two hours maximum, whereas on the bicycles we can put in three, four or five hours at a time.

To give you an insight into a day in the life of a 2012 aspirant, here's a look at the highs and the lows of just one day of the 500-odd to go before the Olympic flame is lit in Stratford on 27 July 2012.

GB rowers tackle a mountain decent in Majorca

Attempt to stand. Legs might not quite straighten after previous day's exertions so hobble around your room pulling on an all-in-one and a t-shirt before providing a morning urine sample, trotting out into the corridor and joining the march of the living dead of fellow rowers along to where the physiologist is waiting to test hydration, take a blood sample from the ear and, most importantly, start the morning banter.

Annabel leads the pack, keeping an eye over her shoulder for Jess Eddie

0830: Fill water bottles with electrolyte drink, stuff pockets full of sweets, bananas and carbo gels and pedal out of the hotel on yet another shift on the Majorcan roads. Expect to put away 1,000 calories in the course of a three-hour ride, and you'll be surprised how good a warm, tropical flavoured carbo gel can taste at the bottom of a mountain after two hours in the saddle.

The stiffness and soreness in the legs soon fade away as you get into the rhythm of the ride, and you begin to enjoy the familiar burn in the quads as the miles roll on. Get used to the sight of Sophie Hosking's back tyre skipping up the hills away from you and Jess Eddie streaking past on the descents.

Experience a few "I love my job" moments with the views from the tops of the hills; and possibly a few "I hate my job" moments getting up there.

After three or four hours on the bike, the day isn't done yet

1400: Pile into the gym for a weights session. You may have begun your international rowing career thinking you would never succumb to the temptation of cheesy music to train to; but in for a penny, in for a pound, you think to yourself as you bop along with everyone else to the Eighties disco mix coming out of the speakers. Who'd have thought that Kylie Minogue could make the dumbbells feel so light? The legs are tired but the spirits are high!

1700: It's time for a date with the love trolley, or the "ergometer" as most people call it.

This grey machine is both best friend and worst enemy: over 75 minutes, experience feelings of pain (surely my legs shouldn't hurt this much after only 10 strokes), rejection (Why won't it give me the scores I want? What have I ever done to it?), excitement (Yes! Check out these scores! I am the Queen of Rowing!!!), inspiration (these splits will terrify my competitors; roll on the World Championships), boredom (I've been here forever; I can't believe I'm only halfway through), jubilation (last 1000m! Hurrah! Only a few more minutes, and I'm outta here!), and convoluted mathematical calculations (2000m left, at this split that's 7 minutes 54.3 seconds, or 138 strokes, or about 6 and a half 300m blocks, or...), but eventually it's all over and it's time for a quick shower before a return to the canteen for another mountain of calories.

The afternoon brings a session in the gym, before an evening in front of the telly

1930: After dinner, you may head to the welcoming hands of the physios who will attempt to breathe life into weary legs and straighten out twisted backs, in preparation for battle to re-commence in the morning.

Gather with the rest of the squad in someone's room for a quick episode of 24 or Grey's Anatomy before bed beckons. As this is the only taste of the outside world that you see, after a while you begin to believe that it's real, and everyone is as beautiful as they are in Grey's, or the world's constantly on the edge of collapse as it is in 24; so it's always a minor relief to get back to Heathrow after a trip away and realise that good old Blighty is reassuringly uneventful, grey and grubby.

So that's a day in the life - or should it be a life in a day? - of anyone courageous and deranged enough to set aside normal life in order to try to go to the Olympics. Every day brings us massive peaks and troughs but we love it for the good times and the bad alike, and this is the life that we've chosen.

I remember listening to the coverage of the final Test over the internet while we were in Poznan for the World Championships, and it was really special to be able to share the winning moment with our coach Paul Thompson, who is Australian.

Cricket is so utterly different to rowing as to be almost incomparable but listening to an interview with Kevin Pietersen recently struck a chord.

He was talking about varying his attack pace; how in the past he’d come to the crease, start batting in first gear, shift up to fifth gear, then normally get himself out because he was playing with such intensity and aggression and he was unable to shift the gear back down again for a spell.

This has seemed very relevant to us in the last few weeks as we have gone from the battleground of Karapiro in New Zealand, where we won the World Championships, to the British winter in the snow and ice, doing the long, plodding sessions that form 90% of our winter training.

Annabel Vernon is now back to training in the cold in a single scull

We've changed from fifth gear back to first or second - and we’ll stay in first or second until we start racing again in April.

If we could do the Olympic Games every week we would but it’s these long, tough, grinding sessions in the winter when we build the engine that we’ll need in the summer.

It’s a lot about finding the positives - and there is something to be said for being out sculling in the bright, fresh winter’s mornings and watching the sun come up over the misty countryside.

Also, having spent virtually every waking moment over the summer spending with the same three or four people in the women’s quad, we’re back to focussing much more on our individual improvement.

I think that’s part of the skill: to learn when to shift up the intensity into four or fifth gear and when to stay in the low gears, to do the mileage, to leave yourself somewhere to go for the really important days.

So back to Karapiro. It wasn’t long after the race that my thoughts turned to next year and what would be waiting for me in 2011. For the crews we beat, especially the 2009 world champions from Ukraine, I'm sure it was even sooner.

Watch Annabel win world gold in the GB quadruple scull in Karapiro (available to UK users only)

I’ve stood in the middle of the Worlds podium before, as well as on either side, and back in 2006 we didn’t make the podium at all, so I’ve seen both sides of the coin.

I know that feeling of relief, of fulfilment, of unadulterated joy when you hear the beep of the finish tower with the rest of the field behind you. I also know the crushing, bitter disappointment that kicks you in the guts when you cross the line at the World Championships having failed to achieve what you wanted to.

I still draw on my experiences in 2006, when Anna Watkins and I missed out on a bronze medal by a tenth of a second. That feeling of sitting in our boat, head in hands, with that all-too-final result up on the scoreboard is not a feeling I ever want to experience again.

We’re motivated, I think, as much by the desire to do well and to keep improving, as by the knowledge of how incomparably horrific it is to fail. The moment of throwing your arms in the air and seeing your flag go up the pole as opposed to hearing someone else’s national anthem or victorious screams.

So we’re back in first or second gear, putting in the miles on the water and the hours in the gym, putting it all into the bank so that we can cash it in next summer when we pick up our oars in anger and fierce determination once more.

Before arriving in New Zealand, I knew it for its rugby, as a destination for many British travellers seeking adventure tourism, and as somewhere my parents went a few years ago and described as being "a bit like Cornwall".

Being from a proudly Cornish family, I knew this was the biggest compliment they could pay any country. So before discussing the rowing, I'm going to first establish: is New Zealand like Cornwall?

There are many similarities. The first thing that struck me is that, like Cornwall, it's a long way from Henley-on-Thames.

To get to New Zealand I saw the sun rise over London, set over the Atlantic somewhere, rise again over the Pacific and finally set in Hamilton, a few hours south of Auckland, on the imaginatively named North Island.

Admittedly Cornwall is a bit closer, being four hours down the A303, but it's still a long way away, OK?

Having spent most of my life getting frustrated at anyone attempting a Cornish accent and ending up sounding Bristolian (there's a BIG difference!), I have tried a Kiwi twang but sounded like someone with an Australian dad and a South African mum, who possibly grew up in Jamaica.

The best way to describe it is that the vowels get jumbled, so 'New Zealand' becomes 'Nu Zillund' and our two bus drivers, Pat and Sue, introduced themselves as 'Pit' and 'So'.

But I will put my hands up and admit there is one area in which NZ kicks Cornwall into touch - they sure know how to put on a show.

This is likely to be the biggest and best World Championships I've attended, probably closer to an Olympics than a Worlds in the way it is set up and presented. It's an incredible environment in which to prepare to race, as there is such a feeling of excitement and anticipation.

Boats stay stacked up as high winds cancel the heat races on day one. Photo: AP

They've constructed a 9,999-seat grandstand, and all the athletes' facilities are seriously top-class. The insurance costs apparently shoot up for a grandstand of 10,000 seats and above, which explains the odd number!

With roughly 800 athletes, this is apparently the biggest event in terms of competitors that they've had in New Zealand since the 1990 Commonwealth Games, and the Kiwis are pretty keen to get involved.

They're also gearing up for the Rugby World Cup next year, and you get the feeling that if the All Blacks don't lift the trophy, there could be riots.

There are huge features on rowing in the newspapers almost every day, trailers on prime-time TV, and in the cafes and bars there are table-top competitions to win VIP packages to the rowing upon the purchase of a certain number of pints of beer.

The nearest big town to the lake, Hamilton, is covered in flags of the nations and banners advertising the rowing; and each café has adopted a certain country to 'support'. New Zealand is currently going through what is probably its most successful period in rowing ever, and is boating almost a full team including two eights - not bad for a country of four million people.

Hamilton is even showing a film in the cinema all about rowing, to prepare the town for what is to come. This whole region has, it seems, made an immense effort to get to know rowing - driven partly, I'm sure, by the success of the Kiwi rowers at recent Olympic Games.

I suppose the key is that for us as athletes, obviously our rowing means absolutely everything to us, and racing at the World Championships is a massive, massive deal.
Yet aside from the Olympics, normally we compete in virtual isolation from the rest of the sports-watching world.

The great thing about the Karapiro experience is that the environment in which we are performing finally matches the excitement we feel about our sport and about our competition.

Everyone you meet sees this as a huge deal and a reason to get really excited. My impression is that the Kiwi view of sport is similar to that of the British: they love it for the sake of it and they don't just have time for winners.

In fact, the only grumble I have about these World Championships is the distinct lack of possessive apostrophes in the signage ("Athletes Restaurant"), but I fully admit that if grammatical errors are the worst thing about this event then that's pretty good going.

This week is, I'm sure, going to be awesome and will give me memories to take to the grave.

The quad that has been racing as Great Britain all summer - Katherine Grainger, Anna Watkins, Beth Rodford and me - put on club kit to represent Marlow, Leander, Gloucester and London.

Here's my diary from the event.

Thursday

We had an early row on the course to get our bearings, check our steering, and to generally enjoy the atmosphere. I had a good look around the course to make sure exactly where the markers are.

At Henley, the row to the start can also be tricky with punts and drunken people in boats charging up and down, so sitting at bow I've put eyes in the back of my head to watch out for all hazards. If we do crash, I will personally take the impact so I'm very keen for that not to happen!

Returned to our national training centre down the road at Caversham for our second session, where it seems pretty quiet after all the excitement of Henley.

The crews not racing are training as normal throughout the regatta so racing is definitely a bonus as it gives you a bit of a rest - we'd all rather race than endure our normal training load of three tough sessions every day.

I find it frustrating that there isn't a full complement of events for women - there are three for women, compared with 16 for men.

The event is run by the Henley Stewards and they are entitled to do what they want; and I am fully aware that for various reasons, including that most women quit rowing in their 30s, the standard of women's domestic rowing doesn't have the same depth as the men's scene.

However, to restrict women to three open events - which means everyone from club rowers to internationals - seems a pity. Let's have a junior event for a start. Henley is such a fantastic showpiece for British rowing it seems a shame to not have a full women's representation.

Friday

Kick-off! And can I say that I am now officially hooked on Henley. With all the fuss about blazers, Pimm's, skirts below the knee and so on, you forget what the essence of Henley Royal Regatta is: absolutely top-class international and club racing on home water, which is, (as I've mentioned before in this blog) the ultimate buzz for any athlete.

I'd also not appreciated just how close the racing lane is to the bank here. You can virtually hear the pop of champagne corks and the chink of glasses; and as you race down the course you almost feel the spectators are right on top of the boats as the boozy cheers from the towpath give way to more restrained applause in the Stewards' Enclosure. This is brilliant!

Most of my mates were doing the social bit today, so after we'd raced I put on my dress and headed out to see them all. Henley's a great place to catch up with people; you can really take the tradition or leave it.

You can opt for the formal blazers, expensive champagne and oysters in Stewards', or go for barbecues in the field and picnics down the riverbank. Whichever way you go, there's such a positive atmosphere in the whole regatta and there's so many friends to bump into.

Saturday

Woke up with a pretty stiff neck this morning - it must have been a consequence of spending most of my rows looking over my shoulder every few strokes.

Having beaten a Belfast crew yesterday, our opposition today is a Canadian quad which is actually a composite of their lightweight and heavyweight doubles.

We thought we'd have a crack at the record to the barrier - about 640 metres down the course - which had been set in 2001, and broke it by a second, which in crosswind conditions was something we were pretty pleased with. Another good row which was a step on from yesterday.

Swung by the press box to do some tweeting for the Rowing Voice, an online magazine for rowers, with Rachel Quarrell and Zoe de Toledo, who are the editors.

The press box is just past the finish line and is in fact set slightly on the course so you get a fantastic view of the boats coming down towards you.

Quick interview for BBC Radio Berkshire, where I was asked about the unique nature of Henley, with Olympians alongside schoolboys and club rowers, but no sense of being stopped for autographs.

My reply was that one of the best things about rowing is that it is very egalitarian: it is such a tough and demanding sport that there's a huge mutual respect between competitors and between rowers at all levels.

I object quite strongly to all these open-top bus parades that seem mandatory now. As one of my friends often points out, "You're not saving the world, you're doing PE."

There are so many people who are contributing to society far more than we are, yet we are held up as heroes. Let's keep perspective over what we do: it's not life or death, it's sport. It's incredibly exciting, passionate, and can dish out tremendous highs as well as crushing lows, but it's still just sport.

Later that evening I cycled back down to the boat tent to get our race times for the following day. Saturday evening is a pretty drunken affair so I had to weave my bike through the crowds of sunburnt Pimm's-soaked punters. We were scheduled for a mid afternoon final.

Sunday

Finals day. After an early row on the course, we returned to my house in Henley to chill out for a few hours before our race. The problem with racing so late is that you miss all the other finals, so we kept up to date with what was happening with Regatta Radio, which broadcasts throughout Henley week.

The wind was building throughout the day and by the time we hit the water, was probably as strong a headwind as any in which I've competed. It made for a pretty brutal race but we were pleased to beat the Kiwi national quad for the win.

After that it was a quick change, prizegiving, and in true Henley fashion, we finished the regatta by swigging champagne from the trophy.

Henley is very very different to any other kind of international racing - there is a reason the last true international race held here was the 1948 Olympic regatta! However, a win is a win, whatever the circumstances, and we're glad to have this boost as we move into the third and final World Cup event in Lucerne.

Watch Sunday's finals of the Lucerne World Cup live on the red button and online (UK only) 0920-1040 and 1200-1355 BST, with selected highlights online afterwards. Annabel's quad races at 1231. Full highlights on Monday on BBC Two, 1400-1500 BST, and for seven days afterwards on iPlayer.

I appreciate how difficult it could be, being pursued by the media 24 hours a day, with your every comment, performance or move on the training pitch being picked over; but the actions of some of the footballers just seem unbelievable to me.

Some England players (as well as players from lots of different countries) have expressed heavy criticism of the match ball. Now, I'm no expert, but I'm guessing that the ball is a fairly important component of the game.

So why come out on the eve of the tournament and tell all your opponents that you can't kick the ball properly? This would be akin to us turning up to the Olympic regatta and telling all the opposition that the oars we had to use weren't any good and that we were going to row really badly with them.

If there was such a thing as a regulation set of oars that we all had to use (which there isn't), I'm sure that the British team would have thoroughly researched them beforehand, and done whatever it takes to get hold of the right equipment prior to the regatta to ensure that we were better prepared than any other team.

In elite sport you have to be uncompromising in your pursuit of success: nothing can get in the way. If there are obstacles that cannot be surmounted, then you find a way to turn them into an advantage.

Why not go on TV and let the world know how confident you feel with it; how it suits your style of play; how it gives you a definite advantage?

So back to rowing, where we're in the middle of the World Cup series. In between the opening regatta in Bled, Slovenia and the one in Munich three weeks later, I went up to Cambridge to cheer on my college, Downing, in the final day of the college 'bumps' races.

I raced bumps for my college back in 2002 and it took me back to why I first found rowing so exciting. The boats are set off a set distance away from each other and all start at the same time.

Annabel's crew in action in the Cambridge May bumps of 2002

The countdown to the start is signalled by a series of cannons and, once the starting cannon goes, the River Cam explodes with shouting, swearing, splashing, hooters, whistles and cheers as the boats try to hit the one in front before getting rear-ended themselves.

On the international scene, Bled was a great regatta for the whole team; the women won three out of their five events - a real boost for the squad.

Munich was more of a mixed bag; Anna Watkins and Katherine Grainger walked the doubles again but when Beth Rodford and I joined them in the quad, we couldn't quite catch the Germans, despite putting in a blistering last 500m.

The World Championships this year are such a long way off - being two months later than normal because they take place in New Zealand - that the World Cups are more a snapshot of a day than a reliable guide to form. So much can change in the next three-and-a-half months.

Before the final World Cup event in Lucerne, we have Henley Royal Regatta which should be very well-attended this year by the international contingent; and this will actually be my first time competing at Henley.

Overall, this looks like an interesting year for the women's sculling team. With Debbie Flood, Katie Solesbury and Frances Houghton still to come back into the boats, crews will be reshuffled but the standard of both double and quad will be extremely high.

Great Britain's two top women's sculling boats won a gold and bronze at the 2007 Worlds, then silver and bronze at the 2008 Olympics, and two world silvers in 2009, so we're still fighting for that double gold, which would be an incredibly special achievement.

Watch highlights of Annabel and the rest of the team in action at the Munich World Cup regatta - on iPlayer until 27 June.

Although Canada topped the medal table and won the coveted men's ice hockey gold, much has been made of the 'Own the Podium' programme, and whether or not this put too much pressure on the Canadian athletes. Did they underperform? Was home expectation too much for them?

I think I'm right to say that every athlete dreams of competing at home. Success on home soil, in front of all your family and friends, would be the ultimate achievement. But at the same time, competing at home brings its own set of pressures and expectations as the clichés about the hopes of a nation get rolled out.

So I thought I'd weigh in with my tuppence-worth of opinion on the subject. Competing at home: hindrance or help?

For most British athletes, home competition is hardly a rarity. Britain is the regular host of many international sporting events as well as our 'traditional' events such as Wimbledon and the London Marathon, and therefore we all have a reasonable idea of what to expect.

Since I've been rowing internationally, I've raced on home water (on Dorney Lake, near Eton) twice: a World Cup in 2005 and the World Championships the following year.

In other sports, off the top of my head I can think of the Commonwealth Games in 2002, the track cycling World Championships in 2008, regular top athletics meets in Birmingham and Gateshead and the recent swimming Duel in the Pool as examples of home competition.

Most of those people involved in 2012 will have experience of competing at home, and I don't just mean athletes. This includes spectators, organizers and volunteers and all those whose lives will be affected by the Games.

We know what it will be like: similar to selling a house, when you have strangers wandering all over it making critical comments.

In 2012 we'll be waiting for planeloads and planeloads of competitors to arrive at Heathrow, and despite the fact we want them to love London like we love London, imperfections and all, we also want them to remember that it's our city.

I remember when the announcement was made in July 2005 about the awarding of the Games to London. We were competing in Switzerland and the whole rowing team crowded around the television in our hotel.

The roar of triumph that erupted when Jacques Rogge said "London" shook the hotel to the ground. We won the bid. We beat the French. We will welcome the world to our country. Come to our rowing lake ... but remember that it's our rowing lake.

The thing to remember is that 2012 is not a surprise. We wanted the Games to come to London, that's why we bid for them, and we've been preparing ever since.

Our coach, Paul Thompson, was in charge of the Australian team in 2000 in Sydney and his experience will be invaluable in ensuring we maximise our home Games.

Seeing how the Chinese responded to home pressure in 2008 when their most hotly tipped rowing crew for gold, the women's double, failed to even make the podium and their second-ranked crew, the quad, beat us to take gold, will stand me in good stead in 2012.

The basic lesson to learn is that some crews will thrive, and some will be throttled: how can I make sure I am the one who steps up?

Remember that no athlete gets involved in elite sport for an easy life. We want the pressure, we thrive on it, it's our job. Steve Redgrave used to constantly remind us in the quad in 2008 that we should want to be the favourites, because the favourites usually win.

Yes, being the underdog might be easier to cope with mentally; but if you are serious about winning, you should want to be in the crosshairs of everyone else.

Of course, there are some who will choke on the pressure of a home Games. That's humans: we're fantastically unpredictable and prone to making mistakes. However, there will be many others who produce a performance out of their skins.

Annabel and her partner last year, Anna Watkins, train in Varese, Italy, ahead of this weekend's selection trials

Why did Tim Henman always get his best results by far at Wimbledon? Because he loved being the home favourite, he thrived on the pressure; it made him play better tennis than anywhere else in the world.

Conversely, another tennis player, Amelie Mauresmo, performed worse at the French Open, her home tournament, than at any other Grand Slam. Some are choked by home pressure, others thrive.

So let's not dwell on the anxiety of a home Games. Let's not talk about the potential for buckling under the weight of expectation.

British athletes are among the best prepared and best supported in the world, and we want a home Games.

I'll finish with a quote from one of the Polish double scull, who beat us to gold at the World Championships in Poland last year.

When asked about having the crowd behind her in the final, Julia Michalska, the stroke, replied: "It was really amazing. During the last 300m it felt as if we had a third person rowing in our boat. It was exactly as our coach had told us before the race: 'You only need to row 1700m. For the last bit, the crowd will carry you to the finish line."

In 2012 that extra person in the boat will be British.