Chris Hoy

The six Olympic gold medals, because at school I was never great at sport. When I look back on my career I think, how on Earth did that happen?

Max Levy, a German sprint cyclist who came second behind me a lot.

Scotland’s rugby captain. My hero Gavin Hastings was captain when he came to our school for a training session when I was 10 or 11. I met him and was blown away.

A road track car, a Porsche GT3. I’ve done the 24-hour race in Le Mans, which was a dream come true.

The London terror attack on 7/7 in 2005. I was in London the day before for the Olympic bid. When we won I thought, “I should stay over – it will be a great party tonight.” But I decided to go back to Manchester for training. Bombs went off on what would have been my route to the station.

Jason Queally, a former teammate. He is older than me and was Olympic champion in Sydney. The way he mentored me, even though he knew I would be a rival, was amazing.

Delivering papers in the freezing cold for my granny. I got paid in Panini football stickers, so it wasn’t all bad.

The real problem is that the pain actually gets worse. You have created massive acidosis in your muscles so there is a huge quantity of hydrogen ions and the pH in your blood changes. For 15 minutes you lie there thinking, "God, this is really bad. I'm going to die. It has never been this bad before." And every time you think exactly the same thing. You have to lie to yourself by saying you're not doing a second set. Then, without moving for 15 minutes, almost to the second, I would roll over and think, "OK, I think I can do a second set now." During those sessions I have never felt more alive or so close to death.

Those lactate sessions were the worst. I'd be in a lab on a turbo trainer and I'd do four 30-second efforts at 100% effort. It sounds so innocuous but the difference between 99% and 100% is huge. You can finish at 99% and you'll be hurting but if you push a tiny bit more – and that's the bit that makes the difference to your training – your legs just grind to a halt. It's like your engine is seizing up. My coach would unclip my feet and pull my leg over the saddle so I could just slide off onto a mat and curl up in a ball.

I don't enjoy it but I know that I have got to live with [myself] if I'm not going to give it 100 per cent. The key thing is getting to the start line and knowing that I couldn't have done any more, that I didn't back off. You accept the pain, because if you didn't there would always be that element of doubt.

I just like to get to the start line knowing there was nothing else I could have done, that there wasn't a single session I didn't give 100 per cent. The physical certainty means you can relax mentally and let the performance come.