We ask four stars the same five questions. See what Fran Halsall (swimming), Anna Watkins (rowing), Lisa Dobriskey (middle distance running) and Lizzie Hawker (endurance running) have to say.

Fran Halsall, Swimming

1. How do you prepare before a big event or race? Do you have any superstitions or rituals?

I usually try and relax as much as possible as I can tend to get over excited. I just think about all the training I’ve done and how prepared I am. I tend to always wear a new costume for an important final, and have a really bad habit of pushing my goggles into my eyes right up until the last second; I think I have a fear of them coming off!

2. Now we’re one year from London 2012 tell us what the Games means to you.

I am so excited about the Games it will be so special to be able to compete in such a massive event in my own country with all my friends and family in the crowd cheering me on.

3. If you could swap places with another sports star for a week who would it be?

Lewis Hamilton, I’d love to see how fast I could get a car round a track.

4. Which event would you most like front row seats for at the London 2012 Olympics?

I have to say the hockey, and hopefully GB in the final to cheer on my boyfriend (GB hockey player Alastair Wilson).

5. Tell me about your favourite kind of training session.

I like to know I’ve trained hard. I don’t enjoy having to do it but the feeling of satisfaction after a really tough workout is my favourite thing about training.

Fran Halsall is supported by Arena (technical sponsor). Go to www.arenainternational.com ^[1]

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Related stories

Swimming: British Swimming unveils World Championship team ^[2]

Endurance running: Lizzy Hawker wins Trans Gran Canaria ^[3]

Rowing: World Cup round-up ^[4]

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Anna Watkins (right), Rowing

1. How do you prepare before a big event or race? Do you have any superstitions or rituals?

I like to give our opposition a big grin to worry them. Rowing is low key, I’ll usually bump into them in the queue for the loo before it’s time to get in the boat.

2. Now we’re one year from London 2012 tell us what the Games means to you.

At the moment, more than a year away, sometimes I can’t sleep with excitement. I think our preparation is as good as it could be at this stage, and I can’t believe I’m the one who gets to have this amazing opportunity. To find the right sport, be the right age, to be in good form at the right time, I think we are an extremely lucky generation of athletes to have a home Olympics to go to.

3. If you could swap places with another sports star for a week who would it be?

Yelena Isinbayeva. It would be cool to learn how to pole vault, and her training can’t be as much as ours. Would I get to look like her for a week, too?

4. Which event would you most like front row seats for at the London 2012 Olympics?

The gymnastics. I’m pleased if I can touch my toes each morning. I’ve applied to watch the women’s uneven bars.

5. Tell me about your favourite kind of training session.

I love cycling up mountains. For us, it’s a novelty to not be in a boat and there’s a much better view from the top of a mountain than on a rowing lake. And best of all, you get to go down again!

Lisa Dobriskey

1. How do you prepare before a big event or race? Do you have any superstitions or rituals?

Usually I try and stay as relaxed and calm as I can, I give myself a lot of relaxation and down-time. I used to have so many superstitions; but I try and completely avoid them now!

2. Now we’re one year from London 2012 tell us what the Games means to you.

The Games mean pretty much everything to me. It is such a special occasion as it is on home soil, it is a once in a lifetime experience for athletes and a massive opportunity.

3. If you could swap places with another sports star for a week who would it be?

I think it would be the skier Lindsey Vonn. Skiing is so different to athletics and a very dangerous sport. I’d like to see how different her routine is to mine.

4. Which event would you most like front row seats for at the London 2012 Olympics?

I would definitely like to watch Philips Idowu in the triple jump, I think that will be amazing. With sports other than athletics it would have to be swimming, I am a big Rebecca Adlington fan.

5. Tell us about your favourite kind of training session.

Track sessions are my favourite. It would have to be 1500m work, pre-season. A typical session would be 12×400m runs with 1 minute in between them.

Lisa Dobriskey is an ambassador for Alfa Romeo - official car supplier to UK Athletics (UKA).

Go to www.alfaromeo.co.uk ^[5]

Lizzie Hawker

1. How do you prepare before a big event or race? Do you have any superstitions or rituals?

For me it is important the week before a big race to find some quiet - to allow myself the time and space to prepare physically and mentally, to absorb some of that beautiful energy of the nature and environment around me, and to realise how lucky we are just to ‘be’.

2. Now we’re one year from London 2012 tell us what the Games means to you.

For me the Olympic Games are embodied by the Olympic creed, “The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win, but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle. The essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well.” The Games are about sporting excellence, but for the athletes, and for the public inspired by what they achieve, it is important to remember that the competition is very much within oneself.

3. If you could swap places with another sports star for a week who would it be?

Could I settle for two days with three different athletes? Paula Radcliffe - because I would love to know what it felt like to run a marathon at world record pace. Chrissie Wellington - because she is an inspirational athlete, a wonderful friend and works so incredibly hard to push herself to find her edge. Julie Tullis (high altitude mountaineer who died in 1986) - because reading her book as a young teenager started me dreaming of the Himalaya.

4. Which event would you most like front row seats for at the London 2012 Olympics and why?

The as yet non-existent 100km race; because then I could give my seats to my family since I might have the chance of qualifying!

5. Tell me about your favourite kind of training session.

Any session where the body-mind connection is very strong so that I am feeling the ‘flow’ and running with heart and soul as well as my head and legs. It doesn’t always happen which makes it all the more precious when it does!

Lizzy Hawker (www.lizzyhawker.com ^[6]) is sponsored by The North Face.

Go to www.thenorthface.com/eu ^[7]

Louise Hudson, Sportsister
The Women’s Sports Magazine