Today, as part of my day as an apprentice at SkillsActive, I went and saw the Olympic and Paralympic Heroes Parade which was an amazing, breathtaking experience. The atmosphere was ecstatic as everyone in Trafalgar Square was wating for the heroes of Beijing to appear, and as they appeared they were waving and smiling at the fans.  The support for  Team GB was fantastic, flags were being waved and chants were being shouted, with school kids chanting ’Rebecca Adlington’ and everyone cheering the atmosphere was incredible.

There was alot of media taking pictures and video’s of this event, and everyone else  was taking pictures of this amazing time too, I watched one lady jumping up and down and other people were climbing on bulidings to take pictures. Boris Johnson delivered a speech, and there were a lot of gifts given out for free such as oyster card holders, Great Britian flags and the best of all gifts was a Plastic Lottery Hand which was a big blue foam hand. There was loads of them, however I never had a chance to get one of them.  Oh well, maybe at London 2012 I can get one. I can’t wait until London 2012, and I bet others can’t either?

Following the wonderful performances of our athletes in Beijing this summer, the Olympic Parade will welcome our Olympic and Paralympic heroes to London with a victory parade through the city to celebrate one of Britain’s most successful Olympics ever – it was our biggest medal haul for one hundred years.

British Paralympic medal count			British Olympic medal count
42 golds	29 silvers	31 bronzes	19 golds	13 silvers	15 bronzes

With all the athletes taking part in Beijing invited, over 500 are expected to join the parade, including Londoner Christine Ohuruogu who said: “It’s great to come back from the Olympic Games and see how much Team GB’s success has been enjoyed by the public. I am looking forward to celebrating with everyone in my home city of London.”

The parade is due to begin in front of the Mansion House in the City at 11am where athletes will travel on a series of floats, on a journey that will take them past St Paul’s Cathedral and down the Strand before arriving in Trafalgar Square at around 12:30pm.  The athletes are due to assemble on the north terrace overlooking the square, and lunchtime crowds, at approximately 1.15pm, with proceedings expected to have been finished by 2pm.

The Olympic and Paralympic flags now fly over City Hall in advance of the 2012 Olympics, and were raised last month by Beijing gold medallist Christine Ohuruogu and Chris Holmes MBE, one of Britain’s most successful Paralympic swimmers. Now, once the celebrations of the 2008 Olympics are over, attention must return to the preparations for 2012.

With programmes such as AASE having delivered success so far, it is time to build on these successes and develop these programmes further, so that we have even more to celebrate in four years time.

Rebecca Adlington, one of Britain’s success stories this summer with two gold medals, recently welcomed the latest intake of AASE swimming apprentices, and said of the scheme: “I’m very excited to welcome the new apprentices on the swimming AASE programme. My apprenticeship with the ASA provided me with high quality training, whilst giving me the opportunity to gain qualifications at the same time.

“Winning two gold medals in Beijing and breaking a world record was the greatest achievement of my life and I hope the new intake of swimmers can work towards further success for British swimming. It would be fantastic to see Great Britain win even more medals in the pool at London 2012.

“I wish the new apprentices the best of luck for their AASE programme and hopefully we’ll see as many of them as possible competing for Great Britain over the next few years.”