Olympics - Paris 2024 Games

EXCLUSIVE BY DAVID COVERDALE, IN PARIS - PICTURES BY ANDY HOOPER: For the first time at an Olympic Games, the athletes' village will contain a creche. And no nation will be putting it to better use than Great Britain, whose 327-strong squad includes a record number of mothers. Such is the changing face of Team GB, a private breastfeeding room and play area have been added to their bespoke performance lodge in Paris. A WhatsApp group has also been set up for sporting supermums to share their parenting and training tips. Here, Mail Sport meets eight of our Olympic mothers and the children who will be cheering them on.

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW BY DAVID COVERDALE: There is a message on the big screen at Loughborough University which reads: 'Welcome to the pool of dreams.' But for the man celebrated on a giant banner behind the blocks, this place was also the scene of a nightmare. It was on a Thursday morning last March that Adam Peaty reached breaking point in the pool, his goggles filling up with tears at the start of a routine swim. For the first time he can remember, he cut short his session and continued to cry in the shower. The triple Olympic champion then drove away from his training base not knowing whether he would ever return. 'I had been trying to fight that inside voice every single day, but that day it got the best of me,' says Peaty, sitting with Mail Sport where he had his breakdown 16 months ago. 'I did 25 metres breaststroke, and I was like, "That's it. Done. Don't care. Put it to bed".

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW BY DAVID COVERDALE: You will most likely know him as the trash-talking, vest-ripping, gold medal-winning sprinter-showman. The American who boasts of having 'main character energy', plays the starring role in a new Netflix series and is now set to be the headline act at the Olympics. There is, though, another side to Noah Lyles, a vulnerability beneath the bravado. Indeed, on his last appearance at the Games, the athlete who usually lights up the track was trapped in darkness. Tokyo was not the first time Lyles has struggled. In fact, he has been in and out of therapy since the age of 10, having been bullied at school for having yellow teeth, caused by medication for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), as well as suffering from asthma and dyslexia. Lyles's mental health really nosedived, though, in 2020, caused by the combination of the Covid pandemic, the uncertainty and then postponement of the Olympics, and the reaction to the killing of George Floyd.

EXCLUSIVE BY DAVID COVERDALE: Not for the first time, Amber Rutter finds herself in the spotlight in the build-up to an Olympics . 'It seems that each time there is some sort of dramatic story to be told,' says the British skeet shooter with a smile. Three years ago, that story was one of heartbreak as Rutter - then known by her maiden name of Hill - tested positive for Covid the night before she was due fly to Tokyo, ruling her out of the Games. This time, though, her tale has a happy ending.

EXCLUSIVE BY DAVID COVERDALE: There will be something a little different about the Olympics this summer. For the first time in 40 years, Sir Steve Redgrave will not be there. The British rowing legend has been an ever-present at the Games from Los Angeles 1984 to Tokyo 2020. He won a famous five consecutive gold medals, before working as a pundit for the BBC, an ambassador for Team GB and, most recently, a coach for China. As things stand, though, Redgrave's only visit to Paris this summer will be for a cruise down the Seine two weeks before the Olympics start. 'The people who go on cruises tend to be my sort of my age and older, so at least they can still remember what I did,' jokes the 62-year-old, who will be making a special guest appearance on the ship alongside fellow Olympic icon Daley Thompson.

DAVID COVERDALE: Olympics organisers have been urged to scrap their 'reckless' plans to hold the opening ceremony on the River Seine, with some teams said to be considering advising their athletes not to attend because of security fears. This summer's Games is due to be the first to stage the ceremony outside of a stadium, with 10,000 athletes set to sail down the Seine on boats in front of 300,000 ticketed spectators watching on from the banks. However, despite 45,000 police officers being deployed on the night of July 26, security concerns have been heightened in recent weeks.