London Olympics 2012: Are we sitting comfortably?

The training: Hoy spends hours in wind tunnel, Wiggins spent weeks cycling at altitude — including 4,000m of climbing a day — Pendleton trained six hours a day for two years solid. Yes, that’s two years.

The money: A cool £20 million of government funding plus a load of Murdoch’s money (via Sky).

The sacrifice: Trott’s dad had to give up cricket to get her to training, and Victoria Pendleton’s boyfriend (now fiancé) had to give up his job as the team’s sports scientist when the relationship was revealed. They brought him back when her form suffered.

The fans: Paul McCartney, Hugh Grant, Prince Harry, Hoy’s mum Carol.

The medal tally so far: A whopping 12, including eight golds.

The stars: Totally Jilly Cooper; some poshos, a royal, a gay guy and a stable girl, and trans-generational — from twenty- to fifty-somethings. Laura Bechtolsheimer (above), Carl Hester, Charlotte Dujardin, Zara Phillips, Mary King, William Fox-Pitt, Nick Skelton.

The rides: Big Star, Valegro, Imperial Cavalier, Uthopia, High Kingdom, Miners Frolic.

The agony: Just try not to fall off: Mary King has broken her neck, her nose and her wrist, cracked numerous ribs and suffered countless concussions.

The spoils: A lie-in (Carl Hester has never had one), access to more fabulous horses.

The hair: Immaculate, with not a hair out of place — horse and rider, please.

The style: Smart. We’re talking Downton Abbey smart (see tech).

The tech: Hasn’t changed much — a top hat for dressage or a hard hat for the jumping and cross-country events; coat, white shirt and stock (hunting tie) for gentlemen and choker for ladies; breeches; riding boots; spurs and gloves. And a saddle.

The training: In dressage the judges are looking for “energy of hindquarters”, “elasticity of back” and “cadence”, so the horses are strong, super-fit and supple. As are the team.

The money: A lot of it. We’re talking oil money here. Although Carl Hester learnt to ride bareback on a donkey and is keen for dressage to lose its high-end reputation.

The sacrifice: In order to help out, one mum got an HGV licence so that she could drive her daughter and the horses to events — at 75, she still does.

The crowd: The entire royal family.

The medal tally so far: Three, including two golds.

The stars: Katherine Grainger and Anna Watkins (above), Alan Campbell, Mark Hunter and Zac Purchase, Andy Triggs Hodge and co in the Men’s Fours, Kat Copeland and Sophie Hosking, Etienne Stott and Tim Baillie. Not forgetting Ben Ainslie, of course.

The rides: Rowing — single, double or quadruple sculls, pairs, fours and eights. Canoes, kayaks — think le camping in France. Sailing.

The agony: Legs so full of lactic acid you can barely walk — nice. On just missing gold, a stricken Zac Purchase said: “This hurts like hell, more than anything else I have ever experienced.”

The spoils: Unbelievable arms, being named Scottish person of the year (Katherine Grainger, again), more hugs from Steve Redgrave.

The hair: Damp and windswept.

The style: Redfaced and messy: these are sports for seriously strapping, sexy people.

The tech: As well as top engineering, there’s high-tech healthcare technology including (drumroll) a blood gas analyser. Yup.

The training: Most spend hours in the water every day, hours on the rowing machine, some weights. Weights. And more weights. Alan Campbell spent the winter running on a beach at Portrush, Northern Ireland, and took only one day off a month.

The money: Team GB rowing is sitting pretty with National Lottery funding and a partnership with Siemens but the canoeists lost their funding after Beijing and had to paddle about for sponsorship — not any more, we suspect, folks.

The sacrifice: Hunter gave up living in a California beach hut teaching novice female rowers — “it was heaven every day” — to train for these Olympics.

The crowd: Pinsent, the Prime Minister and the parents.

The medal tally so far: 14 (canoeing, rowing, sailing), with eight golds.