Episode 1 The Olympic Journey

The clock is ticking.

The final touches are being made to venues, outfits, bodies and minds.

As South America prepares to welcome the Olympics for the very

first time, over 10,000 athletes ready themselves for the

moment of a lifetime.

It's behind closed doors, in the gyms, pools,

rings and empty lakes where the blood, sweat and tears have flowed.

When the spotlight falls in Rio de Janeiro,

it's the work done in the dark

that will determine who shines the brightest

on the biggest stage of all.

In this episode of The Olympic Journey,

Darren Campbell is with one woman

who knows exactly what it takes to win Olympic gold - Jade Jones.

When I'd done it, I felt a bit lost.

There was just so much pressure on me. Now I'm in a good place.

Nick Bright meets super heavyweight boxer Joe Joyce,

whose talent isn't restricted to just one canvas.

You're handy with a paintbrush.

Yeah, I am. Many strings to my bow. You name it, I've done it.

And Clare Balding has been to see the most successful British

dressage rider in history, Charlotte Dujardin.

I'd sat and watched so many riders for years, you know,

thinking, I wish I could get there.

And then all of a sudden, I was there doing it. I'm living my dream.

It's getting up on cold, wet wintry mornings and heading to training,

no matter what, that makes the difference when it really counts.

And I've got up early today to head to Caversham, the home of British

rowing, to catch up with two gold medallists from London who head

to Rio as the red-hot favourites.

Great Britain into the record books!

And such fabulously well done, there!

Great Britain are the Olympic champions,

Helen Glover and Heather Stanning!

We stand up and we salute you!

-Good morning.

-Hello.

-Morning.

Thank you so much for letting me coming along

-so early and disturb your morning session.

-That's all right.

I won't disturb it, obviously. You look so bright and breezy.

-This is obviously what you do every day.

-This is normal for us.

These early mornings are kind of normal.

And it's great to have you along and we'll show you what is

kind of a normal day for us, I guess.

I love this whole place.

-It's a fantastic facility, isn't it?

-Yeah.

You'd better show me where we're off to, then.

-No worries. I think we're going to go to the gym first.

-OK.

So you can kind of get an idea of everyone

getting ready before they go out.

Everybody is in here. They come in here in the morning,

have stretch before they go out.

So it's a kind of social stretch.

Yeah, a bit of a chat, a bit of a social stretch.

Stretching, not any other conditioning?

No, we've got the facilities to do strength and conditioning in here.

Your bodies are so used to training all the time, three times a day,

do you ever still come in feeling stiff?

Yeah. Quite often, actually.

If we've had a really big weight session, the next day, I'll come in

and legs, arms, everything will sort of be hurting from the previous day

and these machines are something you never want

to be told that you're on!

So, this is where you would have an indoor rowing session.

-Yeah.

-And what's the longest you'd have to...

We kind of go up to 24km on these if we have a really long session.

18km would be a fairly standard session.

So kind of an hour and a half on the rowing machine.

What's the theory, then, or the thinking behind

not training on the river all the time, then?

What the rowing machines do is every single time

it's the same thing, so you can monitor your training.

Conditions vary day-to-day on the water.

So when you're on the rowing machine

and every 6km, they come and they test your lactic acid levels,

so they do a pinprick in your ear, test your lactic acid.

-While you are rowing?

-Well, you stop for about a minute.

And what they do is they just monitor your effort levels

so you can know if the number you're producing correlates to

the effort that you feel and your lactic acid.

So, it's probably the most scientific thing we do

in checking our levels of fitness and our levels of training.

We do that about once a week.

You can tell a little bit about your glycogen levels, as well,

so if you are over-training and under-fuelled, that's another indicator.

You won't be producing as much lactic acid and that will show, as well.

So you'll be trying really hard but it won't be showing in your blood

levels and then you know, "I need to eat more, fuel up."

And so they work your diet out

-sometimes on the basis of that, as well?

-Yes.

And is this six days a week, this regime?

-Yeah.

-Sometimes seven. But, yeah.

Six days here and then on a Sunday we'll be training in our own time.

So it's really seven days a week and we get

a day off every 3-6 weeks.

OK, let's go back through there and see...

come through to the boathouse.

Oh, my. And it is a boathouse!

-It is a boathouse. Full of boats!

-How many boats in here?

A few less than usual because,

obviously, all the Rio boats have gone.

-So the Rio boats are in Brazil?

-Yeah.

And these are your second best boats.

-Yeah.

-This is our boat.

It's the one we won with in London. Never lost a race yet.

Never lost a race?

We've used it the whole way through this Olympiad,

so the world championships, the world cups,

and we've been really fortunate that we've managed to get

a new boat to go out to Rio.

So, you obviously think the new boat is better because it

wouldn't be the one going out there. So, what's the difference?

-If I was to look at it, would I see anything different?

-Probably not.

It's just newer, so what happens to the carbon and things like that

is it just loses a bit of its stiffness, so it's basically the same.

You wouldn't think it's any different.

-Do you like it, the new boat?

-We do, yeah.

But you're very fond of this one.

We'd be happy to race in this one,

but if anything is faster, it'd probably be the new boat, so...

It's a bit more shiny.

THEY LAUGH

Helen and Heather have found consistency and a level of

contentment with each other, both inside and outside of the boat,

and that's made them a formidable force.

London was great and it was an experience

that we never expected to have in our lifetimes.

To go and to win gold at a home game was just incredible.

You hear the word Olympic and you just get a swell of pride.

We're so lucky to do this. We are fortunate.

And, OK, so it's come with hard work,

but we get to sit there on the start line and as much as it's

stressful and as much as you feel at times you don't want to be

there because you're in this most pressurised situation,

you know that there will be so many other people who would

grab that seat from you and take your place,

so we feel really fortunate and really lucky to be there, as well.

Relationships are so important in sport -

who you train with, who you live with.

Darren Campbell has been along to meet Olympic taekwondo champion

Jade Jones, who just happens to live with

world champion Bianca Walkden.

I'm outside the National Taekwondo Centre

in East Manchester.

Inside, the athletes are beginning their final preparations for

the biggest competition of their lives, the Olympics.

You little beauty!

And the teenage kicking superstar from North Wales

is the Olympic champion!

That's it, Bianca Walkden is world champion!

SHE SCREAMS

You can see the sweat pouring off them

and now the head guards are out.

This should be interesting!

And this type of session, it seems really intense.

No, this one's the easy one. This one's the easy one.

The hard ones are when they can go after you

and you have to go after them.

-Right.

-It's a war.

Is a lot of what you were doing today really trying to

programme the subconscious,

so come the moment when you're fighting,

anything that happens, you're able just to react?

Yeah, definitely, like, for the Olympics,

it's a totally new system that we haven't been used to going on and

it's a lot harder to score

and then also, like, going high and punches.

We have to, like, totally change our game a little bit.

Right, ladies, I've watched you train, spar, hit each other,

defend with pads.

Now I want to see how that dynamic changes by coming to your house,

because you're housemates, live together, friends.

-Is that all right?

-Yeah.

-Cool.

You have got a kettle, yeah?

-Yeah.

-Yeah!

-THEY LAUGH

How is it living together?

Because you've literally just come from a session.

I think it's good. I think we get...

We've even got better living together, like,

because we train really hard together and then we come

back and we say, "Why did you do this?"

And try and help each other improve in training for the next

session and things like that.

All we want to do is be the best, so if I try and push her,

she tries to push me, we're only going to get better, so yeah.

I like it.

I think it's good that we're different weight categories, though.

Say if there was a house full of 57s,

I'd hate that because, do you know what I mean,

I wouldn't want to get too close to them and I wouldn't want to

be too friendly, whereas because we're totally opposite ends of

the weight, we can fully push and help each other without...

And then switch on when you need to.

Because I just need to check something,

-it's just you two that live here, yeah?

-Yeah, it is just me and Jade.

OK. My question is, why do you have two fridges?

One's for Jade and one's for me!

-OK, is this one Jade's?

-Yeah.

-Yeah?

The small one!

-And this one is yours.

-Yeah.

-OK.

Why have you got two fridges?

She's a heavyweight so...

THEY LAUGH

-Strawberries there.

-Jade's strawberries!

-Yes.

Let's have a look in this one. Make sure you're doing things right, yes.

Get the pepper out.

Brilliant, brilliant.

OK, I can see you are focused, definitely focused on Rio.

-Healthy food in there. Can I see where you guys chill out?

-Yeah.

So, who is learning to play the piano?

Me, I go every Tuesday for half an hour.

It's like counselling. I go there and just switch off.

Just get to do something completely different,

like I don't even talk about taekwondo with the instructor or nothing like that.

Sometimes I practise but most of the time it is just on the Tuesday.

THEY LAUGH

So, Jade, four years ago, London 2012, Olympic champion.

Did you expect that?

I think it was like the journey going into the Olympics,

it was fast.

I think I only came into the academy in 2010 so it was like two

years to go and I was only...

Like, no-one was expecting me to even go to the Olympics.

So it all just went so fast and, literally,

six months to go I got picked.

It was like, you know, give everything I had.

I did actually believe that I could win, I was going there to win.

But when I had done it, I felt a bit lost and, like,

there was just so much pressure on me and I just felt so lost.

Now I am in a good place and I am just trying to get to do it

-again, really.

-Have you had to fall back in love with taekwondo?

Yeah, definitely.

There are times, when you have a hard loss, or there are times when

you think, "God, do I even want to do this any more?

"It is so hard and I'm not even enjoying it."

But, again, I just revert back to why I was doing it when I was a kid.

I absolutely just loved taekwondo and loved the kicks.

Just wanted to win, like, you don't even know why you want to win,

-you just want to win.

-And, Bianca, was it difficult Jade winning gold?

Obviously, she is your friend and you were pleased that she won gold

-but, for you, you couldn't compete.

-Yeah, it wasn't nice at all.

Obviously we live together and I was there training as well,

just with her.

And the next minute I broke my leg and then Jade goes and she

gets to go out and win the Olympics.

But I can't do nothing about that and, like, obviously, she

showed us, like, it can happen, if anything, do you know what I mean?

I can take it one way and hate her but I can take it the other way

and be, like, look what she's done, do you know what I mean?

We can do the same thing.

I think it feels even more special because, "Let's do it together now."

It is our chance to both get gold together as friends.

GABBY: Jade and Bianca have a real chance of securing medals at the

Rio Olympics.

If they do, it will mark out the GB taekwondo academy as

a great success story.

Fighting for gold is something British boxers know all about.

Nick Bright went to meet GB star Joe Joyce,

to find out what life is like for a boxer when the gloves are off.

So, Joe, we're at where it all began for you,

Earlsfield Amateur Boxing Club. How does it feel when you are in it?

It feels like home, back where I feel comfortable.

-And where it all began, obviously.

-How did it all begin for you?

I was 22, turning 23.

I was cycling round trying to find this...

Cos I knew there was a boxing gym around here.

I wanted to go and hit a bag and maybe do some sparring.

Then Sid got me to come to the boxing session and, you know,

I could just see the progression and I was enjoying myself.

I had my first bout.

You get in the ring and you're like, the referee comes over,

he checks you have got a box, he checks your gloves,

you have got your gumshield, brings you both together and then you

touch gloves and look at your opponent.

Then you walk back to your corner and then - ding! -

then it is like, "Yeah, what have you got?"

Breathe. Believe. Breathe and believe.

Come on, three!

He's a lovely kid, really. He's a gentle giant.

He looks menacing but he is not at all.

He's easy to work with, which is important, really.

You can have the best kids in the world but if they won't listen

and they won't work with you, you will never get anywhere.

Part of the reason why you started boxing at 22,

which some people might say is quite old to start boxing,

is because you used to do rugby, athletics, karate...

Kick boxing, kung fu, capoeira.

-I mean, there's loads.

-Swimming.

-Swimming.

-And diving.

I mean, it is an amazing CV of different sports that you

have done and now you have found one that has finally stuck.

Yeah, I think it got to a point when I was doing other sports that

I would kind of get bored with it and move on to something else.

"I would like to try this."

So I think it is good that I found boxing so late because,

maybe if I had started earlier,

I might have got bored with that and moved on to something else.

So, you know, it was good.

-Good luck, Joe.

-Nice one.

-I wanted to speak about Juan because he is your trainer...

-Mentor.

Mentor and trainer.

Because I always used to go to Putney Leisure Centre and I

would be on the diving boards, like diving,

swimming. I think he was doing personal training.

I can see talent, you know. Here, every day, you feel talent.

The amount of talent, the mentality is not there.

When I saw Joe, he was full of energy, full of talent.

At the same time he had the mentality.

He started training me at the gym. He was basically, "You can do this.

"You have got sporting potential.

"You can go here and I can show you how to get there."

When I started boxing, he was like, if he wants to do this boxing,

then take him to the proper place to, you know, get trained in it.

So I went to Cuba,

stayed with his brother and I was training there for 21 days.

I had practised the techniques over and over again, with repetition.

When I came back, I won the GBs,

won the ABAs and then got in the GB squad.

-It was life-changing for you.

-It was life-changing.

Thanks for letting us come and have a snoop around.

We're here to talk about some of this stuff that you do

-outside of boxing. Because you're handy with a paintbrush.

-Yeah, I am.

How did you get into this? Tell me about it.

I was always good at art at school.

From there, I went to Middlesex to do a BA with fine art.

I also got to do an exchange in Sacramento State University

in my last year. So, yeah, I picked up a lot more skills along the way.

Many strings to my bow. You name it, I have done it, pretty much.

I did cheerleading in the States, in university.

I reckon you were one of the guys that threw the people in

the air, rather than the guy being thrown in the air.

No, I wasn't like, "Woo!"

You pick the girl up, throw them,

catch them by their feet and then you can do other moves.

You can, like, hold them with one hand.

So you have to be really strong.

You have now qualified for Rio.

You're going to be at the Olympic Games. How does that feel?

It is great.

It's like, you set targets and this is one of my targets from

a long time ago, from when I was doing athletics.

I wanted to get to the Olympics. It is finally here.

How much do you want the gold? Three. There you go.

He's beaten 90% of the guys there so as long as

he performs at his best and he delivers on the day and

everything goes the right way, there's

no reason why Joe Joyce can't win a gold medal.

You do all these things, you experiment with loads of

different sports, you paint and you box.

No wonder, on the back of your top it says, "No ordinary Joe".

Yeah, because I'm quite extraordinary.

And my head's getting a bit heavy!

So I do all these neck exercises.

It'll only get heavier with a gold medal round your neck.

Oh, yeah.

If you have been inspired to get involved in sport, then click on...

It's here in the inner sanctum of GB rowing that Helen and

Heather and the rest of the squad put in their hard hours,

training, testing and competing against each other.

Refuelling is such an important part of these rowers' daily routines.

I'm meeting up with the men's coxless four for breakfast,

where I want to find out what it's like to be part of the boat

which carries the very highest of expectations.

Great Britain get the gold medal! And relief all round.

Great Britain have come up and Great Britain are the Olympic

champions and the crowd are going mad!

Gold medal, Great Britain. Wonderfully done.

We have done it, we have done it and we have done it in style!

Great Britain, the Olympic champions once more.

Does it feel like you have a little bit more pressure on your shoulders?

I think so. It has been four now and we're hoping to get the fifth gold.

And the expectation is there, the coxless four always wins.

But also, there's pressure but then when you get into this boat,

you think, this is one of the best chances of gold in the whole squad.

I would much rather be in a boat that

has a really good chance of winning gold but massive pressure,

massive potential for quite a public failure.

That's kind of why we do sport. We don't want to just play it safe.

So what is going to be the thing then that carries you over the line?

The strength of our programme is we do train really hard

for four years.

Lots of countries train hard for one year or six months or eight

months, or whatever.

But we do train hard.

That's a long time. Four years is a long time.

If you can string together four years uninjured, consistent, hard,

high-volume training, you're probably going to win.

And the guys that beat us, they're the same,

they also are able to string together huge periods of training.

On that basis, this four-year journey in this cycle, what

is it like for those people around you who love you and care about you?

It can't be easy having a six-foot- eight guy turn up knackered,

doesn't want to talk, just wants to lie down and then doesn't

want to discuss his day, doesn't want to listen about their day.

-I can't imagine it's very easy.

-Do you know anybody like that?

-Yeah.

-THEY LAUGH

-I don't know how long I'm going to carry on this sport, but I can

definitely envisage a life after rowing and not having

to get up at, like, savagely early every morning and flog

ourselves up and down this lake and miss weekends.

You know, these are not things I kind of masochistically enjoy.

These are the price of success. And, you know,

the cost is worth it,

but it is definitely a cost rather than some perverse pleasure.

I look forward to the day when I have energy.

I'm fit, probably one of the fittest people in the country, maybe,

with all the training, but I don't feel fit when I get home, I feel knackered.

But isn't that the true mark of a professional sports person

anyway, that you're never, you know, you don't feel as fit

as people think you should be because you're just so tired?

It's not normal, is it, the amount of work you put your body through?

No matter how many calories a day you're consuming,

which is what, 6,000-7,000?

One or two of us have got these new snazzy heart rate monitors,

and I think they tell you afterwards...

-Don't they tell you how much rest you needed after a session?

-Go on, what was it?

After the first of your three sessions a day,

-it'll tell you you need 18 hours of rest now, or something.

-Do you know what,

hearing you, and we all suspect the intensity of what you do and

seeing you in that environment and how often you're out there training every single day,

I kind of understand why rowers seem to be the best criers

on the podium, because it feels like...

-LAUGHTER

-We're so knackered.

"I'm tired and emotional. I've just got to get this out."

You kind of get it, it's just an outpouring, isn't it,

after the end of that cycle?

Tears of relief. Tomorrow's a day off.

LAUGHTER

Tomorrow's a lie-in, a day off, and a cold beer.

How easy is it to make sure you stay on the same page in terms of

your goals and aspirations?

We find it pretty easy because I think we actually complement each other.

I think if we were two of the same, it would be really difficult.

I think I'm probably a bit more energetic in my delivery of

things and kind of quite focused.

I feel like I drive a lot of the things that we do,

and Heather definitely, sort of... Um... Oh, what's the word?

..absorbs a lot of it. And if we were both one-way, I think that

would really butt heads, or it would be really kind of placid.

From the outside, you might think... You're about to become a major

in the army, so you might think from the outside,

oh, you'd be the barky one, you'd be the one that would

be kind of much more noisy and much more verbose.

-Is that what you're like in your army life as well?

-I think so, I've probably always been

a bit more someone who leads by example than leads by saying.

I'm not necessarily the most vocal person, I'm not very good at expressing myself,

so in terms of that sort of thing, actually,

I am much more receptive, I can be told what to do and listen than...

So, yeah, I don't know, I'm kind of...

I'm not your typical army officer, who is like,

"Follow me and let's go, I'm going to shout at you all the orders" sort of thing.

I am a bit more kind of stand back and observe.

When you drive out those gates on an evening, eventually,

are you in touch with each other in the evenings, or is your life

-outside very separate?

-We probably keep in touch too much.

Normally because I've forgotten something or I need to remind Heather of something.

Most nights we'll have a text saying,

"Remember Gabby Logan is coming in tomorrow."

THEY LAUGH

There's always a reminder that we need for the next day or something.

But no, at the weekend, Heather's coming over for a barbecue.

Yeah, we'll hang out plenty. Which is really sad.

We're friends away from this environment as well, which is nice.

We can leave rowing at rowing and go away and hang out and do

stuff together as friends.

It's not all about the rowing, which is quite nice.

Helen and Heather are clearly inspirational characters.

They love rowing, love what they do.

Becoming the best and having the drive and determination to

stay there is certainly an inspirational trait,

one that Charlotte Dujardin has in spades, along with

no shortage of talent, as Clare Balding has been finding out.

-COMMENTATOR:

-What a performance. She certainly has lived up to all the expectations.

This is not a dream.

Britain rule the world in both team dressage and have the

Olympic champion.

So, this is Blueberry. That's his nickname.

Valegro is obviously his proper name.

-COMMENTATOR:

-They are a partnership that Britain has never, ever seen before.

I'd sat and watched so many riders for years, you know,

thinking, "I wish I could get there, I really wish I could get there."

And then all of a sudden, I was there doing it,

and not just doing it, I was winning.

And I'm like, "I'm living my dream."

When you have that relationship and that feeling that you know

your horse has given you everything,

it was a really emotional feeling, so he's a very, very special horse.

Carl, given that you've played such a huge role in training people,

but also riding yourself at the top level for Great Britain,

what would you say makes a great dressage rider?

I suppose if you describe dressage,

it's a perfect marriage between a horse and a rider.

So for that, to have that perfect marriage, you've got to have, pretty

much like a normal marriage, you've got to have sensitivity, you know,

you've got to have feeling for the movements and how the horse moves.

A good dressage rider has that patience and that ability to

bring out the best in a horse.

Probably takes four or five years to train one to Grand Prix. That is quite a long time.

If Carl says to you, "Charlotte, you're not doing

"that right," or, "You're not working hard enough, do it again,"

-do you give him lip back?

-No. I like being told it's not good.

You know, I want to make everything as perfect as I can get it.

Carl, on the other hand, he is the one that gives me lip.

I am for ever... He is called "Excuse.com".

So if I ever say anything, there is always an excuse,

there's always an answer as to why it's not done properly.

But as soon as he gets in that arena,

he is such a pro at test riding.

I don't have all the knowledge that Carl has,

so I still really look upon him to give me that security and

that knowledge and confidence to be reassured that it is OK.

What is it about Valegro that makes him the best in the world?

Just enjoys work, I would say.

You know, I think that's what's so special about him,

is that he has that mentality to work.

He's not a lazy person, he's a really active person.

I'm just now imagining his profile.

Like if there was an equine form of...Tinder.

"Fit, strong, athlete, bright, funny, independent."

He's the perfect man, I think.

THEY LAUGH

Will you feel nervous this time round about Rio?

I do know that I have to go there to enjoy it and, you know,

at the end of the day, it is an Olympic Games,

but it is just another show, another arena, doing the same thing.

Nothing different, nothing changes, other than the fact I'm in Rio.

Rio will be very different for you, certainly,

because of the expectations that's now on her shoulders,

and has been ever since London every year.

And you have delivered the goods, but it hasn't been as easy to generate the fun all the way

through it because it means so much more now to you,

me, the whole team, the whole of British dressage.

This will be his last year doing this.

I feel like we have achieved so much together.

And he is my best friend and it is going to be quite sad for me

going to Rio knowing that that's probably going to be one of the last

times I compete him.

My life is going to be very boring after you, Blueberry.

GABBY LOGAN: Those dark days of training will soon make way for the

megawatt glare of the Olympic Games.

The relationships forged so deep over the past four years will

be tested to the limit.

It's not long now until the eyes of the world are on Brazil.

All that's left is the fine tuning.

The clock is ticking.

Destiny is waiting.

Time to grasp it with both hands.

-COMMENTATOR:

-Jessica Ennis-Hill is back on top of the world.

Peaty wins the gold.

Nicola Adams has just made history.

David Rudisha! Gold for Kenya.

His 18th Olympic gold medal.

And Bolt gets it!

They are world champions again.

Charlotte Dujardin has iced the cake in style.

Bradley Wiggins is the Olympic champion.

Oh, that's a huge jump.

Laura Trott crosses the line as the world champion.

Mo Farah streaking away!