I must admit when I first saw an advert for a junior sports politics reporter, I had not fully grasped exactly what the role would involve. Perhaps that was one of the reasons I did not make the initial shortlist for interviews, something I have since been made aware of.

Thankfully, the insidethegames hierarchy eventually took a punt on a young and as yet unformed reporter. As they say, the rest is history.

I was almost immediately thrown into the deep end, in true insidethegames style. 

Having been effectively babysat when Durban submitted its bid proposal to the Commonwealth Games Federation in London, I was soon informed I would be travelling to the South African city for what turned out to be an ill-fated endeavour to host the 2022 Commonwealth Games.

A first of what would become several trips to the future Olympic and Paralympic host city of Tokyo gave another indication of the opportunities that were on offer.

Looking back, the first year was a real education. I attempted to soak up as much information as I could from my altogether more informed colleagues about the intricacies of the Olympic Movement, the names and faces to look out for and which of their many hats they were wearing at any given time.

An example of this was the Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC) General Assembly in Washington D.C., which felt a leap forwards in understanding how the Movement operated.

The event also marked one of the more bizarre episodes of my tenure when our media centre (hotel bar) became home to an annual drag queen pageant, which apparently coincides with Halloween each year.

Unusual and in some cases frightening moments included staying in what appeared to be a red-light district in Toronto during the Pan American Games and watching as a bus drove at some speed past our taxi in Baku, which was reversing the other way down a main road, having taken a wrong turn.

My eyebrows were increasingly raised during a press conference thrown by the Mayor of Taipei at his office during a Summer Universiade, where he labelled pension protestors as "bastards" and discussed the potential threat of ISIS to the event. A search for WiFi at the winter version of the event in the Russian city Krasnoyarsk resulted in the discovery of the Donald Trump-themed burger restaurant.

A Beijing 2022 venue tour also took a remarkable turn, when a bemused International Olympic Committee (IOC) Coordination Commission found themselves watching a near hour-long robot dinosaur show laid on by organisers, complete with asteroid annihilation.

You can make your own jokes.

The Olympic Movement continually delivered stories to cover, whether you expected them or not.

I was swept up, literally, in a Greta Thunberg march through the centre of the Olympic capital during the Winter Youth Olympics, marking one of few times in 2020 where it was okay to be part of a large-scale crowd.

An apology is probably owed to Greta, as if there were heat maps of the world for all the insidethegames employees during my time here, I would almost certainly have covered the most ground.

From the bustling city of Buenos Aires, a fantastic trip to the Faroe Islands and Oceanian stops in Fiji and Samoa, I have been able to experience places and cultures I never thought I would. There has been a degree of robustness required, having spent significant time travelling to both Gold Coast and Tokyo in the build-up to Commonwealth Games and the Olympics.

Two memorable journeys stand out. The high demand for flights to Japan for the latter stages of the 2019 Rugby World Cup led to my journey to the Tokyo 2020 Coordination Commission meeting and back being via Addis Ababa. I’ll leave you to plot the route from Samoa to Peru.

Those latter countries provided two of the most fascinating stories I have covered on the ground, with the first being my introduction to the controversy that would surround weightlifter Laurel Hubbard following the Pacific Games and on to the Olympics. The second featuring podium protests at the Pan American Games and watching how our initial reporting played a role in a fencing competition at a continental event becoming a major discussion point in the United States.

Complex issues such as the participation of transgender athletes in sport and the ' rights have been something I have enjoyed the challenge of covering, often as there are strong opinions on different sides of the debates.

It reflects the level of trust given to reporters here that I have been able to do so freely, both reporting on the scene and having been granted this Sunday blog slot at the start of 2016 to write about largely whatever I wanted. At first it was as if being pushed off like a child on a bike without stabilisers, before gradually becoming more equipped to interrogate issues.

Early on I wondered whether anyone would read or care about what I wrote here.

It was notion dispelled by one sporting official who had disagreed with a view I had expressed about them more than a year earlier - a view I still hold. Having double-checked my name the official placed their hand on my arm and calmly said, "If you kill a man, you cannot bring him back from the dead", leaving a colleague on their first trip looking on perplexed.

I remain none the wiser as to whether it was a threat or a mere declaration of disapproval at my piece. In fairness, the statement is accurate if you take it literally.

I have been blessed by my time here coinciding with several key events in the Olympic Movement.

The Russian doping scandal started to emerge into the open in 2015 and has become a never-ending saga. The Olympic bidding process has shifted dramatically, with the historic double awarding of 2024 and 2028, the potentially final competitive race for 2026, and the move to the targeted and somewhat opaque process for 2030 and 2032.

The gradual consolidation of power in hands of a few IOC officials, the rise of the athletes’ movements and governance scandals at certain International Federations have been other major topics to explore.

The COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on the Tokyo 2020 and Beijing 2022 Olympic and Paralympic Games, as well as the human rights concerns with the latter, have meant there has never been a shortage of news.

Both Tokyo 2020 and Beijing 2022 were among those to provide "pinch me" moments, having been fortunate to be at the heart of events so many people would have wanted to attend, but so few could.

I had that feeling when writing this column while watching Naomi Osaka make her return to the tennis court at Tokyo 2020, just hours after she had lit the Olympic Cauldron. I was one of only a handful of people in the Ariake Coliseum, meaning winners were met with only a smattering of applause. 

The question will always remain over what the experience would have been like with a crowd.

As a result, I felt compelled later in the Games to check out a local train station overlooking the BMX venue, having on a previous visit commented that people would be able to watch for free come the Games. Little did I know at the time people would be scrambling to get just a taste of live Olympic action there.

I commented to someone recently that Beijing 2022 felt like an end-of-year exam at school, with the Kamila Valieva case having combined almost all the elements of the past seven years at insidethegames thrown into one cocktail.

The case mixed in Russia, doping, IOC politics, the World Anti-doping Agency, Court of Arbitration for Sport and athlete welfare, with a separate course of human rights concerns and a global pandemic.

The Valieva story felt like a very fitting one to conclude my time here, and could not have been achieved without the support of the whole insidethegames team.

It has been a pleasure to work with current and former colleagues. Especially in the less glamorous moments, such as the hours spent sat in hotel lobbies or standing in front of random airport signs for photos.

I will always look back and laugh at the panic caused by a pre-Commonwealth Games Opening Ceremony downpour, leading to one broken laptop and a colleague dictating updates. Or their purchase of a questionably-named cheese, which had us in hysterics at the same Games. 

While there are too many to thank by name, I must once again express my gratitude to our editor Duncan Mackay and managing director Sarah Bowron for providing countless opportunities to me over the years. I would encourage any current or incoming reporters to seize whatever chances come their way.

I am certain I will miss the role and my colleagues, who I am sure will continue to provide the best daily coverage of the Olympic Movement. 

Personally, I am relishing the chance to pursue new opportunities and challenges, building on everything I have learnt in my time here.

Thanks to all those who have read my work over the years. If you want to keep in touch, you can find me on Twitter here.

*PS. I will confess now to being the only reporter to have accidentally damaged an insidethegames tie.