I’ve liked all my jobs, amazingly.

I was the PE technician at my old secondary school, so I had to pump up all the balls, wash all the kits and get the form notes in before morning registration every day.

At university, I worked at a hotel in housekeeping. We saw so many weird things in people’s rooms. Guests would leave sex and party stuff behind!

I was a waiter with my old friend Justin Clayton; we would sneak in too many drinks and were fired after spilling soup too many times on customers.

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.

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.

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?

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.

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.