Day 5, Wednesday 1st August: Quite a day!

Well! Once the sitting down sport started, the medals were always going to start rolling in. It started with the Women's Pair, who won our first gold of the games, and the first gold for women ever in rowing. They were the favourites but had been so nonchalant in the build up (this is our biggest race of the season) that they'd left Redgrave appalled (this is the biggest race of your lives), but he didn't want to say anything and ramp up the pressure.

They won in some style though, getting out to an early lead that was so comprehensive the other boats, according to Pinsent later, seemed to settle into a race for silver. But the lead was so great that they had to be brought back a bit, and the World Champion NZ team closed the gap but nowhere near enough.

The scenes afterwards were great, Redgrave hugging them hard & long despite his reserve, Pinsent bouncing around, tears, messages from rhe front. Glover only started rowing 5 years ago when her mum saw an ad in the paper, the other is in the army (so we had a videolink to her troops in Afghanistan).

Some rowing facts from James Cracknell:

• rowing has been in since 1896 but before Redgrave & Holmes in 84, our only previous gold was in 48.
• Women only got to row in 76, and only over the same distance as the men in 88

20 minutes later it was the turn of the eight, Constantine Louloudis, Alex Partridge, James Foad, Tom Ransley, Ric Egington, Mo Sbihi, Greg Searle, Matt Langridge and cox Phelan Hill, up against the very powerful World Champions Germany, and reigning Olympic Champions Canada. I saw the Germans training on Monday and to my untrained eye, they looked pretty good!

Great Britain weren't expected to win, but were definitely medal contenders, and with Greg Searle back in the boat aged 40, and our first Muslim rower, there were plenty of stories in there.

As it turned out, despite a strong start, they probably spent too much going for gold and not settling for silver, and ended up with bronze.

Next up, with due respect to the rowers, was the main event of the day, the Time Trial. Admittedly I am a huge cycling fan, and it was going past the front door of the office, but with cut out & keep sidies on the front of most of the tabloids, the anticipation for this one was enormous!

The women were out first, but the course didn't suit the tiny Emma Pooley, who would have preferred something hillier, so our Beijing silver medallist came in 5th, and Armitstead 10th.

Then came the men, and our office was at the 3km to go mark, so they were into the final push at this point. As they started to go through, the speed of the later rides was very impressive - Froome was the fastest we saw initially, on his way to a brilliant bronze (what a season to have the second best season ever for a British cyclist...!), but Pinotti was quick, as were Tony Martin, the World Champion, and Taylor Phinney, the American who ended up in 4th in both road race & time trial! Cancellara was last out but following his crash on Saturday, he wasn't really in the running.

As for Wiggo, he's a force of nature this season. With the previous riders I'd got pictures of all of them, but maybe it was the speed, maybe it was the excitement, but by the time I'd got the picture off he was gone! He was so fast. We then ran back over the road to watch him finish it off in style, the only one finishing inside 51 minutes.

After sitting on his throne for a bit, Wiggold set off on his bike to salute the fans, before collecting his medal, and finally seeming to enjoy his amazing year. He gave some great interviews later as well, referring to the theft of his training kit as a lucky person putting some sweaty kit with skids in it on ebay, and calling Hampton Court Palace "this castle"...brilliant. Further comments cemented his man of the people status:

After the medal ceremony, which saw Wiggins receive the fourth Olympic gold of his remarkable career and Froome a richly deserved bronze, the time trial champion got back on his bike to thank "the real fans".

"I wanted to see my wife, but also all the people who had stood by the roadside and shouted through the whole thing," said Wiggins.

"Usually, the great thing about cycling is that anybody can watch it, it's very accessible. But here [at the start and finish] you have to be in the chosen few, it's a bit of a prawn-sandwich fest. We all know about Olympic ticketing, so it was nice to go back out and just show some appreciation for all that they did for that hour. It's a shame they, the real fans, couldn't see the ceremony, so it was nice to go out and roll up and down."

There are whisperings that he & Froome don't get on, but the
FROOME-DOG looks pretty happy here, photographed by girlfriend Michelle Cound.

Here's one of Froome as he went past the office:

And here's a great one of Wiggo, both brought to you by Davey Alvarez! Thanks Davey.

The next excitement came from the battered sav boys in the individual all-round gymnastics. A medal here was always an outside bet, but Kristian Thomas was right in there all day, and only a mistake on the vault pushed him out of the medals.

Later, at the pool, there were high hopes for the 200m breaststroke, having qualified 1st & 3rd for the final. It sounded like a very exciting race (we were driving back from the station!), and it took a world record from the Hungarian to beat Michael Jamieson into silver.

I don't know to what extent the swimming team had been talked up beforehand, but 2 medals so far is a bit disappointing. Lot of pressure on Adlington to win the expected gold in the 800m tomorrow. On the otherhand, it's been an exciting event, the French have been impressive, Phelps is on the wane but is still fighting on, Lochte isn't having it all his own way, not all medals are going where expected, which is always good. And Ian Thorpe has been an excellent pundit