Superfit... but not strong enough to walk to the shops

LAURA: We are weird creatures who have evolved to do only one thing. Take us out of that habitat and we’re goners.

Take me to an ordinary gym and I’m useless. I can’t manage five minutes on the running machine.

Don’t ask me to do anything with my arms, like press-ups or tricep dips. All my muscle and power is below the waist. Even standing up hurts. And we don’t go food shopping because we can’t walk for that long. Twenty minutes pushing a trolley is horrendous.

JASON: As a speed merchant who trains only on the track, I can’t ride a road bike for more than an hour without hurting all over.

I also can’t walk to the shops because they’re more than ten minutes away, and ten minutes of walking is enough to make my back hurt.

LAURA: It sounds like a joke, I know, but I can’t take a bus or a train because there’s a chance there might be no seats available. No standing, remember?

The bus might be late, or the train cancelled. More standing. Public transport, germs everywhere. Illnesses galore. Can’t do it. Can’t risk it.

JASON: You have to have a balance between obsession and everyday life. We are supposed to use hand-wash gels before every meal, after every handshake. It cuts down on germs and reduces the chances of us missing training with illness, or – far worse – having four years of preparation destroyed by a runny nose just before an Olympic final. At our training camps, experts hold a special light over our fingers and show us all the areas we missed.