CHRIS RAWLINSON

©Press Association

WEEK 1
Date: July 31

Europa Cup win heralds best of times

What a week. It started after the incredible victory of the men's team at the Europa Cup in Gateshead. Justifiably I feel we received great acclaim for the result. I think everyone except the team thought we were doomed to fail, but an animal is all the more dangerous when backed into a corner, as we demonstrated. Congratulations to the boys. Media-wise I appear to be the man of the moment.

This was made more apparent to me when I was aksed to appear in Manchester on July 24 for the Norwich Union Star Track Scheme. Apart from having to set off at 7am, it was a great day with a little bit of coaching and media work to do, the whole thing spoilt only by the prospect of signing autographs: If you saw one of my autographs you would understand - spiders and ink spring to mind!

Training went as well as can be expected at this stage. My coach, Nick Dakin, is still "beasting" me to death with the lure of a carrot, this particular carrot being speed work, which we intend to start next week, heralding the moment when I start to ease down in training and can look forward to easier days.

Meanwhile, torture came in the form of two hard running sessions and one harness session, pulling in a harness, which made me feel extremely sick. I also endured a weights session and finally a hard bike and circuits set. I have to tell you this so you fully appreciate what a bad man Nick Dakin is! You try and tell him you need to rest down, or taper, from hard work come the summer.

On the track, all is well and one session that I repeat a lot is "split fours" (200m x 2 with 90 seconds recovery in between, the second being run with hurdles). I did it 0.5 seconds quicker than last month. It might not seem a lot - but it is. I hope all my Olympic rivals are reading this because, if you aren't worried now, you should be.

The unlucky people that have the arduous task of keeping me in one piece did a good job as usual, Doug giving me a massage on Wednesday and Roger cracking my bones back into place on Thursday.

It is said that all work and no play is a "no-go" for an athlete so to take my mind off the Olympic Games and the pressures associated with it I took in a cocktail of shopping and Playstation, enough to take anyone beyond reality. By the way, Mark, old mucker, don't take it personally that you lost at Golf - after all, what's eight shots between friends!

Read Chris's diary for WEEK 2 ...

Read Chris's diary for WEEK 3 ...

Read Chris's diary for WEEK 4 ...

Read Chris's diary for WEEK 5 ...