Tracing Lord Coe's career

Lord Sebastian Coe, the British Olympic Association's new chairman, who brought us a successful Olympics and Paralympics this summer, has published his autobiography.

In Seb Coe Running My Life, the former Olympic athlete traces his career from competing in Sheffield, through to breaking 12 world records and being the only athlete to win two gold medals in the 1500 metres in two successive Olympics - Moscow in 1980 and Los Angeles in 1984.

He also writes about the huge part he had to play in London's bid for the Olympics and Paralympics in 2005.

Coe was born in Hammersmith in 1956 and was brought up in Sheffield. It was the Mexico City Olympics in 1968 which inspired him to join the athletics squad the Hallamshire Harriers at 12.

He was coached by his father and went to Loughborough University and had a famous rivalry with fellow athlete Steve Ovett.

But in the 1990s Lord Coe switched from athletics to politics and served in John Major's Conservative Government from 1992 to 1997 and even rose to the role of William Hague's chief of staff. Hague was leader of the Tory party from 1997 to 2001.

Coe was made a life peer in 2000 and was given the title Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 2006 New Year's Honours List for services to sport.