Kelly's planning a special Christmas

The kids make no bones about it. They want to be like Holmes and 2012 is their time.

On the day that London's bid was winging its way to Lausanne to truly mark the beginning of the biggest Olympic race of all between five competing cities, it was wonderful to hear both Holmes, a bid ambassador, and Alevel student Christmas, the reigning English Schools 1,500m champion, enthusing about the prospect.

"It would most likely be my first Olympics and a dream to do it in front of home support," pondered Christmas. Training with Holmes, says the youngster from Horley, makes her feel anything's possible by the time she's 24.

It isn't a boot camp here, she and her mates smile, but it's rare hard work nonetheless, being up at the crack of dawn, training twice a day in the searing heat and being subject to the sort of mental discipline Holmes has imposed on herself over a decade of high achievement.

They can't slack because Holmes is never off their case 24-7. "Remember, I have eyes in the back of my head. I am spying on you everywhere you go," she tells them and they giggle nervously. Oh yes, they've learned something else. That Olympic champions can be ordinary, approachable and fun too.

Dani's favourite moment of the camp? When she discovered the fatal weakness in the double Olympic champion's armoury by gleefully splashing a horrified Holmes with freezing cold water during a brief respite from training at Sun City.

We always knew Holmes was remarkable but, in a way, this camp has revealed her to be a complete oneoff.

It has been an astounding achievement for a woman still competing as a full-time athlete to have devised, to

have attracted five-figure funding from British athletics' top backers Norwich Union and to have organised such a detailed and complex camp herself. All in the middle of being feted like few Olympians ever have.

Such is her celebrity now that she says she could be earning in a day at the moment what she's getting in a month here.

She could be hob-nobbing with the likes of Tom Cruise instead of doing a 7am to 1am day, fine-tuning the detailed schedule.

That she is so obviously enjoying this experiment, though, and that she is so evidently good at it persuades you this is the field where her future ought to lie.

SHE shrugs that she does not know what her next challenge will be - the betting is on her running at least until the 2006 Commonwealth Games if she can keep her drive and fitness - but if UK Athletics haven't already had the wit to try to tap her up to help them in some capacity in the future, then they ought to be shot.

For the moment, she'll settle for firing a few young imaginations.

Glancing at young Christmas, a slight kid who was once forced to give up gymnastics because she broke both arms when falling out of a tree and who has battled on undeterred in athletics, perhaps she senses a bit of the toughness that has taken her to the summit.

"Yes, I see a lot of determination in her," enthuses Holmes. "She had a small ankle injury when she first came here and I had to get her doing gym and pool training which she hadn't done before.

"You could see she was upset because she couldn't train with the rest of the girls but when she came back this week, she applied herself with real determination. My aim now is to get her mindset right to become a champion."

Imagine you are 16 and an Olympic champion tells you this. Holmes may not be able to give as much time as she'd like in her bid ambassadorial role because of her racing commitments but her inspiration to these girls may yet prove her lasting legacy to London 2012.

Holmes says she would never take credit for a four-week programme leading to a gold in eight years time but she undersells herself.

"The thing is that being around her makes you think 'I can do it, I can be a champion too'," says Dani, who finishes the course on Friday.

"I wish we didn't have to go home yet, it's been so great." Christmas presents, it appears, come no better.