Vicki Barr's Olympic Diary - Part One

She has agreed to complete a diary for BBC Sport on her progress, experiences and thoughts during the games.

Here is the first of her diary entries, ahead of her long flight out to the Far East.

It was when I came back home that I began to be coached by Jared Deacon. For those of you who don't know, Jared was an international athlete himself at both the 400m and 400m hurdles so knew exactly what it took to succeed and perfom to your best. My 400m journey had now officially begun!

In 2007 after training mainly for 100m and 200m, Jared thought it would be a good idea to try a 400m, and my initial reaction was: "Ok this is going to be tough but lets give it a go."

My first 400m race introduced me to the dreaded LACTIC and is something I have become very familiar with. By the end of 2007, I achieved a bronze medal at the AAA's and booked a seat on the plane to the World Championships in Osaka as part of the 4x400m relay team.

Olympic Year

The main event for all athletes has been building up for the Beijing Olympics 2008; and this was my main and only motivation throughout the long and gruelling winter season.

I knew I had to work as hard as possible in every training session if I was going to make the team.

I opened up my season in Geneva, Switzerland where I ran a personal best of 52.44 and from then on I travelled around Europe competing on the circuit.

At the moment I have not even begun to pack or even thought about what I should take, packing has never been something I am good at!

Then all of a sudden time passed quickly and the trials were here, this year they were held at Alexander Stadium in Birmingham.

I managed to win my heat and then got a silver medal in the final, finishing behind Lee McConnell of Scotland.

After the trails I had a long wait to see if I had made the team as part of the 4x400m relay.

On Saturday, 19 June at around 11:00am I received a call from the selectors to say I had made it. It was a MASSIVE relief.

Preparation

My preparation for the games involves spending 10 days in Macau (China) at the GB holding camp. Here I will continue my training programme, all the time trying to acclimatise to the heat and humidity.

This will be a great opportunity for me to train with my team-mates and hopefully learn as much as possible along the way.

On 14 August I will head into the Athletes Village in Beijing and continue to train as normal.

The heats of the 4x400m take place on 22 August with the final being held the following day. I predict that we will definitely win a medal in relay as we have an extremely strong team including the World Championships Gold and Silver medallists Nicola [Sanders] and Christine [Ohuruogu].

We won bronze last year at the Worlds so I am hoping we can improve on that this year.

Finally...

I leave on Monday, 4 August, where I will take a 12-hour flight from Heathrow to Hong Kong and then hop on a ferry over to Macau.

At the moment I have not even begun to pack or even thought about what I should take, packing has never been something I am good at! :-)

Don't worry though, I will start tomorrow and hopefully will be finished by Monday. As long as I have my running spikes and competition kit, that's all that matters!

Bye for now, speak to you all once I have reached Macau.

Vic x