If you are all consumed by the Olympic Games you may have missed the latest milestone in the countdown to the 2013 British & Irish Lions tour to Australia.
On the same day as Usain Bolt ran 9.63 sec to retain his Olympic 100 metre crown, the clock ticked through to 300 DAYS TO GO to the opening game on next year's tour.
The 10 match trip will, of course, kick-off in Hong Kong with a match against the Barbarains on 1 June. Then it will be on to Australia for the business end of the trip – three Tests, five clashes with Super Rugby franchises and a game against a Combined NSW/Queensland XV.
The predictions are that anything up to 40,000 fans will form the now renowned 'Red Army' following the Lions. If you haven't registered your interest yet with Lions Rugby Travel, the Official travel agents for the tour, then you had better get in quick.
Click on the link http://www.lionstour.com and get involved in not only supporting your country, but enjoying the rugby expereince of a lifetime. The Lions haven't won a sereis since Martin Johnson's side of 1997 beat the then world champions Springboks 2-1.
But they left South Africa on a high in 2009 with a wonderful win in the third Test in Johannesburg and will be seeking revenge for their narrow 2-1 defeat to the Wallabies in the 2001 series. The Tom Richards Trophy is definitely in the sights of the 2013 Lions.
Just to let you know how close 300 days actually is, we've converted it into other time units for you:
• 9 months, 27 days
• 42 weeks
• 7200 hours
• 432,000 minutes
• 25,920,000 seconds
It will be 300 days to go to the first game on Australian territory, against the Western Force in Perth on Thursday, 9 August.
