I spent the night with Beccy Adlington, and Sharron Davies, and Jo Jackson, and nearly all the girls from the England swimming team and, er, Adrian Moorhouse!
I'd better explain. We all flew back overnight from the Commonwealth Games in Delhi where the swimmers rounded off a successful week's work, despite many succumbing to Delhi Belly, with the best tally of medals in any Commonwealths away from home, and narrowed the gap with Australia with London 2012 looming.
Anyway, none of us were looking at our absolute best when we stumbled off the plane and into Terminal 5 at Heathrow, but some had more reason to deal with the tiredness than others.
I asked Beccy how she had slept? "Not bad for the first 20 minutes," she replied. "But not much for the remaining nine hours!" Still, I reasoned with her, it's probably easier to deal with when you've just won two gold medals (and a relay bronze) at the Commonwealth Games. "Oh yes," she responded, with a small twinkle in her tired eyes.
You get the feeling that after a tricky 19 months or so after her unexpected two gold medals at the Beijing Olympics, which saw a third and fourth place at last year's worlds in the 400 and 800 metresfreestyle, and then a 7th in the European 800 metresin August before storming to victory in the 400 metres,Beccy is well and truly back. I, for one, look forward to seeing what Britain's golden girl will do next in 2011 and then, the big one, in 2012.
