Working at my first ever Paralympic Games in Beijing, this Londonista heard and understood the maxim: 'Heroes are born at the Olympics; Heroes come to the Paralympics.' The Paralympics are the equivalent of the Olympics for athletes with physical, mental, and sensorial disabilities (so you'll see athletes with all sorts of disabilities, amputations, blindness, cerebral palsy etc). Each sport's heats and finals are now well under way, building up to a finale this Wednesday......

Gold! Gold, I tell 'ee. Gold, in them thar doldrums, damn yer eyes! Ahh, hahahahahaha! We 'opes you'll forgive us old sea dogs splicin' the mainbrace in honour of our crew what's brought treasure back to these shores. Aye, aye! It's first mate Andrew Simpson o' Chertsey and his cap'n Iain Percy takin' our golden haul to five in the Star class sailing. Ahh, hahahaha... [That's enough piracy - Scurvy Landlubbing Ed] The excellent......

More medals for Britain, and "Team London", yesterday, but the seemingly relentless success in some sports is causing a nervous shuffling of feet in others. After Twickenham's Mo Farah slipped out of the 5,000m heats Brendan Foster, BBC commentator and former Olympic medallist at 10,000m, could contain himself no longer: I just feel Mo Farah ran a very poor race. He needs to be taught how to run tactically. He's got a good finish......

And it came to pass that Team GB didst look upon their works and, behold, they were good. And on the twelfth day they rested. Well, comparatively speaking anyway. Today there are only eleven gold medals available across the whole games, the fewest on any official competition day except the opening Saturday where events were barely getting started. Even on the final day of competition twelve golds are up for grabs. Just like the......

Even though we're ten days into the Games of the 29th Olympiad there are still some competitors yet to get their campaigns underway. Two such athletes are pre-Beijing Londonist interviewees Jessica Walker (above left) and Anna Hemmings who, at 11am precisely (all times BST) will have about 1 minute and 40 seconds to paddle their kayak over the 1000m course at Shunyi, recently vacated by the rowers, and qualify for Thursday morning's semi-finals. They've......

Please sit down before reading this. Great Britain is third in the Olympic medal table. There's only China and the US ahead of us at the moment. Such lofty attainment is almost certainly unique in the years since we last held the Games ourselves in 1948. It's getting to the point where hard won silver and bronze medals in particular are having to fight to be noticed amongst headlines dripping with gold. Team London,......

As we pen this latest despatch from the land of Olympia we are hunched over our table, bracing ourselves for the avalanche of must-see denouments and prospective medals set to sweep us away on this middle Saturday of the Games. So far London can lay claim only to a share in Emma Pooley's road cycling silver, but over the next few hours the medal chances come thick and fast, not least in the rowing......

But hark! Is that the sound of the William Tell Overture in the distance? It is! And with it comes a marauding horde of London track and field competitors poised to take over the Olympic show as, for a lot of casual observers, the Olympics get properly underway. We at Londonist, as you know, look to wider horizons, but it was a bit difficult yesterday as both the sailors and the oarsfolk were forced......

Our first duty today is to apologise to Bryony Shaw that we somehow neglected to mention her embarking on her quest for a medal out at Qingdao (above) in the Windsurfing event. Our slight obviously hasn't perturbed the Wandsworth native unduly as she's already manoeuvred herself into the bronze medal position after 2 races of a total of 11. Her class is listed as RS:X, but actually only one class is ever used at......

After some good old British summer weekend weather had outdoor athletes scurrying for cover (except for Nicole Cook and her fellow cyclists who somehow largely avoided skidding into brick walls fronted by ditches) our first representatives on show today are the men's hockey team led by recent Londonist interviewee Ben Hawes, who get their campaign underway at 3:30am (all times BST) against Pakistan, a traditional hockey superpower, but currently ranked only one place above......

While the capital's track and field hopefuls quietly build up to their first events next Friday, our rowers dive into action straight away, though by the time they get going at 7:50am (all times BST) boxer James DeGale could already be packing his bags. The Commonwealth Games bronze medallist and recent silver medallist at European Union level, known as "Chunky" to anybody who'd be comfortable sparring with him, faces 2007 African Champion Mohamed Hikal......

Oxford pulls ahead. Image courtesy of Simon-K's photostream via the Londonist Flickr pool Oxford prevailed. But you probably know that by now. And the view from the shore? Wet. But Londonist was there. In the name of journalism, we packed ourselves into the Doom Bar tent in Furnival Gardens yesterday with 300 of our closest newly acquired friends and did our best not to spill/be spilled on/grind/be grinded on whilst waiting optimistically for the rain......