Rowing legend Matthew Pinsent knows a thing or two about Olympic preparation.
After his debut at Barcelona in 1992, he retired with four gold medals and a tearful goodbye in Athens in 2004.
With less than a year to go before Beijing, how might the world's Olympic hopefuls be preparing for the biggest stage in sport?
Pinsent - now reporting on BBC's Inside Sport - reveals the psychological demands, how training should be tailored, and explains that current form is not necessarily the best guide to who will be on the podium.
WILL BEIJING BE THE MAIN FOCUS?
There will be a variety of aspirations among the others who have qualified or are close to qualifying. Some will be preparing to make the final four or a top-five finish, while others are targeting the podium or just going for gold.
It is quite easy to start planning what you want to do in Beijing. The really successful athletes will be putting many stepping stones in place between now and August.
They will be using the trials, world championships or certain mini events to improve their technique, get faster or prove themselves against opponents.
Asking yourself where you will be in a year is still a significant moment: dreaming of opening ceremonies, living in the Olympic village or just being part of the Games.
Whether you have qualified or not, it is hard not to think about all of this and to make sure you don't get too excited.
DRAWING UP THE PLAN
The athletes should now know where in the world they will be every day until Beijing and even the time of their race or event.
To draw up their 2007/2008 diary they would work backwards from that time and schedule everything.
This would cover their competitions, training, rest days, pre-Olympic training camp, flights to Beijing, the few days in the village and competition day.
A more detailed hourly schedule would be worked out with three to six months to go.
HITTING YOUR PEAK
Knowing when and how often to compete to be at your best is a hard balance.
In rowing there was never too much competition - if anything there was too little, but this varies across all the sports.
The calendars of sprinters or cyclists are jammed, but they have to be very careful not to burn out.
Marathon runners only have two to three top class races in a season. If they want to run at the peak of their powers next August they will be looking to race in autumn, next spring and, apart from smaller runs, that will be it.
You cannot push yourself hard for 12 months thinking that is the best way to find your form - you still have a chance to rest and take a dip in form.
In rowing there is always a down period of four to six weeks in every year. We usually had a holiday in October and then trained all the way through to the Olympics from November.
You then build up your speed to be at its absolute peak in that final.
Many Olympic gold medallists have actually done very little in medal terms with a year to go.
Our rowing team always seemed to be favourites the year before but it was never a comfortable position to be in. Peaking with 12 months to go should not be a priority.
INSIDE YOUR HEAD
Every aspiring Olympic star knows they will get out of bed that particular morning every four years and have to be the best in the world at what they do.
Knowing way ahead of time this day will be the biggest day of your life has very particular emotional and psychological demands. You have to mentally rehearse this moment and imagine what it will feel like.
It can be a very lonely feeling knowing today's the day. A rowing race is six minutes long and there was no room for mistakes if you wanted a medal.
I didn't find the visualisation that easy, but I did a lot of it. Three years before each Olympics I started to think about my opponents, the race, the lake.
It goes through your mind over and over again, and the closer you get, the process gets quicker and more addictive.
With a year to go you will be thinking about it four to five hours a day, and by next summer it will be all day every day and some of the nights.
The Olympics has a unique atmosphere. Some relish it and many favourites fall because of it.
IN THE CITY
You instinctively know that all the Olympic host cities will throw up different challenges and Beijing is no different.
We knew Atlanta would be humid and Athens would be hot. Beijing will be very hot, humid, and everybody is talking about the pollution.
The culture has little effect because you don't actually get that immersed in the city. You stay in the village which is very international and the food is westernised.
Other regional things to consider will be the weather, jet lag, where you are going to train and the holding camp.
But ultimately it is still a sporting challenge. To us rowers it didn't matter where the water was. It was still water and we knew how to row on water!
LOOKING AHEAD
No names are put on Olympic medals with 12 months to go and many athletes dramatically burst on the scene late on. Everything is still up for grabs.
It is still a very long time and there is a huge amount of preparation any athlete can do - especially on the mental side.
And if any athlete has half an eye on London 2012 then five years is a huge amount of time.
In 1987 - five years before my first Olympic medal - I was rowing at a reasonable level, but not international level.
I was not even that good for my age group. So in five years I went from schoolboy to Olympic champion.
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Many will not know they will be in China until the new year at the earliest - some will find out four to six weeks before - so just getting there and this summer's activities will be the key focus.
Matthew Pinsent can be seen on Inside Sport when the new series kicks off on Monday 3 September.
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