Joan Collins

Doing 20 minutes of stretching, light weights and floor exercises three times a week takes the same amount of time as a long coffee break - and eating a tuna fish salad, sardines on toast or scrambled eggs is surely preferable to a Big Mac or KFC.

We live in a quick-fix society where we need instant gratification for everything. Too fat? Get lipo-sucked. Stringy hair? Glue on extensions. Wrinkles and lines? Head to the beauty shop for a pot of the latest miracle skin stuff. It's all a beautiful £1 billion con foisted upon insecure women by canny cosmetic conglomerates.

Over the past decade... while many businesses have pursued what I call 'business as usual,' I have been part of a different, smaller business movement, one that tried to put idealism back on the agenda.

As I have discovered by examining my past, I started out as a child. Coincidentally, so did my brother. My mother did not put all her eggs in one basket, so to speak: she gave me a younger brother named Russell, who taught me what was meant by 'survival of the fittest.'

The closer I get to retirement, the more I feel it will be a huge change, a shock, because athletics has been the core of my whole life. I know I'll miss the feeling of running fast, the adrenaline rush, and hearing the crowd cheering me on.