If there was the opportunity to climb a mountain, or to go ballooning, or some adventurous activity, I would always be keen to do it. I loved the countryside.

Our house was bombed, and the roof fell in. We were sitting under the stairs of the basement, and we were quite safe, but it brought home the realization. In two nights 400 people were killed in small town.

Beating John Landy was my defining race.

It is the brain, not the heart or lungs, that is the critical organ.

I found longer races boring. I found the mile just perfect.

If a man coaches himself, then he has only himself to blame when he is beaten.

I was playing rugby and the other games English school children do, and there was an event which was planned in which races were run, and I simply just won these by a considerable margin