I have the mentality of a winner. I first went to the Olympic Games when I was 17, three weeks after my O-levels, and I remember sitting in a dining-hall filled with the world's best athletes.

Sport fosters many things that are good; teamwork and leadership.

The only limitations are mental. The guy who thinks positively will win.

I'm competitive - that's what defines me - and I love it.

I don't even have my own computer.

Sometimes you have to resist working on your strengths in favour of your weaknesses. The decathlon requires a wide range of skills.

If you don't want to grow old, then slow down the slowing down process.

Being a decathlete is like having ten girlfriends. You have to love them all, and you can't afford losing one.

Having the ambition of becoming Olympic champion is a whole different ambition from wanting to be the greatest.

Los Angeles was great fun because it was the polar opposite of Moscow in 1980. It was sunny and bright, lots of colours around, whereas Moscow was dark and oppressive.

When I lost my decathlon world record I took it like a man. I only cried for ten hours.

Our first half is about how to make a living, and our second half has the promise of being about how to make a life.

When we look out into space, we are looking into our own origins, because we are truly children of the stars.

From the very first, I knew that it would be so...I smiled to myself, and said, "That -- and none other.

Broke is normal. Why be normal?

Youth, with swift feet, walks onward in the way; the land of joy lies all before his eyes.

Giving people a hand up, not a handout, is the way forward.

I don't get 'shark' - but who cares!

There are moments when mental overload can render words impossible.

My bones are tired from all the tragedy in me.

In looking around me seeking for miserable resources against the heaviness of time, I open a book and I say to myself, as the cat to the fox: I have only one good turn, but I need no other.