My wife, Hannah. She’s amazing and keeps me in check. I met her 24 years ago at drama school.

My grandson, for taking such wonderful care of me in my old age.

Carol Vorderman, because she’s stuck her head above the parapet to try to hold our bizarre politicians to account.

It's not a competition.

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.

The real problem is that the pain actually gets worse. You have created massive acidosis in your muscles so there is a huge quantity of hydrogen ions and the pH in your blood changes. For 15 minutes you lie there thinking, "God, this is really bad. I'm going to die. It has never been this bad before." And every time you think exactly the same thing. You have to lie to yourself by saying you're not doing a second set. Then, without moving for 15 minutes, almost to the second, I would roll over and think, "OK, I think I can do a second set now." During those sessions I have never felt more alive or so close to death.

Max Levy, a German sprint cyclist who came second behind me a lot.

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.

Those lactate sessions were the worst. I'd be in a lab on a turbo trainer and I'd do four 30-second efforts at 100% effort. It sounds so innocuous but the difference between 99% and 100% is huge. You can finish at 99% and you'll be hurting but if you push a tiny bit more – and that's the bit that makes the difference to your training – your legs just grind to a halt. It's like your engine is seizing up. My coach would unclip my feet and pull my leg over the saddle so I could just slide off onto a mat and curl up in a ball.

Delivering papers in the freezing cold for my granny. I got paid in Panini football stickers, so it wasn’t all bad.