Tom George: British rower breaks 2km indoor rowing record during lockdown

Breaking a record previously held by Sir Matthew Pinsent and Moe Sbihi is one thing. Doing so in your parents' garage during a global pandemic is quite another.

But Tom George has made lockdown count for something - breaking the GB Rowing Team 2km indoor rowing record with only paint cans and DIY tools for company.

His time of five minutes, 39.6 seconds - achieved on his own, at his parents' Gloucestershire home on 30 May - makes him the first British rower, and only the 10th man ever, to dip under the 5.40 barrier.

A Union Flag hangs on the wall, perhaps a reminder of what it's all about and why he pushes himself to such limits.

"I walked back into the house, my parents asked how it went, I said 'it was OK, I'm just going to go have a shower'," George tells BBC Sport.

"After I'd had a shower, I thought I'd better tell them what had just happened in the garage, because it was actually quite big."

Quite big indeed. Between them, Pinsent and Sbihi have amassed five Olympic gold medals, while George, 25, was scheduled to make his Games debut in Tokyo this summer.

Lockdown means George hasn't been out on the water since early March, and has instead spent far more time on the rowing machine than he'd probably care for.

But he is reaping the benefits of that and the increased cycling he has added to his training programme, putting him in peak position to attempt to break the record - previously 5.40 held by Sbihi.

"I don't think I necessarily set out with the aim of doing it," George says. "I felt I was in pretty good shape and I thought I was putting myself in a position where I was physiologically able to have a crack at it.

"The first kilometre ticked by and I was on exactly the split I wanted to be on, and then at the halfway mark, it was a case of 'if not now, when">