Britain's modern pentathletes have been offering the ultimate evidence of their dedication to the cause of fitness for the last fortnight. They've been following in Paula Radcliffe's footsteps.

The British team preparing for this weekend's World Cup final in London - the 2012 test event will host the fencing and swimming at the Crystal Palace National Sports Centre before moving operations to Greenwich Park for the riding and run/shoot elements - have been working hard at altitude in the training venue where Britain's world marathon record holder has spent so much of her time in the past decade.

Did I say "very hard"? Make that "very, very hard". The second version is the verdict delivered by the man who has overseen more than a dozen years of medal-winning success as the GB Performance Director - Jan Bartu.

"We have been training at between 1,800 and 2,100 metres altitude," he reports. "It's not bone-breaking, but the effect of training for two weeks at this altitude is significant."

You get the feeling that if actual bone-breaking training was seen to be efficacious in the grand scheme of things, it might well be considered.

Five Britons have qualified to compete at Crystal Palace and Greenwich Park - Jamie Cooke and Nick Weybridge go in the men's competition tomorrow, and the women's team for the following day comprises Heather Fell, Freyja Prentice and Mhairi Spence.

It is the first of three big modern pentathlon events this year along with the European Championships, which will be held in Medway three weeks afterwards, and the World Championships, which will take place in Moscow from September 8-14. All three events will contribute towards automatic qualification places for London 2012.

But no matter how well Britain's competitors do this year, there is a stark bottom line. A maximum of two men and two women can qualify for London 2012. For the women, who have five of six competitors with a potential chance, the maths is particularly cruel.


Fell (pictured) has already survived the process once, going on to win silver at the Beijing Games. But those Games reverberate with a different meaning for Spence, who missed the cut by one place in 2008 and had the bittersweet experience of watching it as part of a scheme being run for talented fringe members by the British Olympic Association.

"The last Olympic cycle was a bit difficult for me, and I am aware now that this is my last chance to achieve my dream," she said. "The fact that the Olympic Games is on home soil is a massive motivation for me. But the level of competition within the squad is so great that there is a long way to go before I can say I am going to be there on the day competing.

"In a way it was a really good idea to take us to Beijing in order to experience the Games. We went to the holding camp in Macau, and then on to Beijing. We saw the Olympic Village. It was something I could use in the future. But it was a little bit of a teaser in one sense. I said to myself: 'I want to be there for real rather than watching on the sidelines.'

"It was a really tough time for me mentally. I had qualified in third place, but only two women could compete in Beijing. My confidence took a knock, and it took me a while to find the inner strength to try again. But there were two girls who were better than me, so they deserved to compete at the Games. For me it was a situation of sheer desperation and despair. I want to do everything humanly possible to make sure I'm not in that situation next year.

"But the fact that there are several of us fighting for those two places benefits us all in one way, because it means whoever qualifies will need to be in the best shape possible to challenge for medals, and we need medals to maintain our funding for the next four years. So while I will be giving 100 per cent to be one of the two who go to the Games, if it is not me I will support whoever it is because we all want to make sure of the future of our sport."

Prentice also spoke to me earlier this year about the mix of pressure and support on offer at the team's base in the University of Bath.

"We have great facilities here," she said. "We have amazing nutritional support, conditioning, we have sports masseurs, physios, everyone at our beck and call. If we have any problems the medics are on it straight away, specialist sports doctors, psychologists. We have everything.

"But then it puts on the pressure. Everything is building you up to this competition. It does have extra pressure. And there is a cut, and only selected athletes can make that."

So what does the man who makes the final decisions have to say about all this angst?

"Let's make one thing absolutely clear," Bartu told me. "The athletes who will in the end be in the Olympic team - they earned it. It's not going to be political decision.

"This group will fight for the selection. It's going to be decided in competition - their performance will determine. So in that respect it is a self-managing process.

"Now we know there will be disappointments, there will be heartbreaking situations for athletes and coaches coming up. We need to prepare for this as a team. Because we go through this together and there is a future after the Games. It's not the end of the world.

"Everybody must understand. It's life, isn't it? Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. That philosophical approach I would suggest to all athletes on the starting grid. You have your life, this is fantastic, sport, Olympics medals, but there are more important things in life than that. So let's get perspective.

"After the Games we have the World Championships, another Games coming up in four years – see the bigger picture of what's going on. I hope that this approach should help us to keep the dynamics positive so we will be focussing on how to beat the opposition and not to compete inside the team. That could be detrimental to our hopes. It has to be that that aggression goes outwards.

"The selection is made at the last minute. You stay on your toes. And that's how it's supposed to be because we did the same thing for Beijing and Athens. The purpose of it is you need to continue working hard. There's no room for complacency. And that gives you confidence to go out and compete as best you can."

A harsh philosophy perhaps. But count the Olympic medals: Gold and bronze in Sydney, bronze in Athens, silver in Beijing. You strongly feel there is another on its way in London 2012...

Mike Rowbottom, one of Britain's most talented sportswriters, has covered the last five Summer and four Winter Olympics for The Independent. Previously he has worked for the Daily Mail, The Times, The Observer, the Sunday Correspondent and The Guardian. He is now chief feature writer for insidethegames. Rowbottom's Twitter feed can be accessed here.