With 190 days left until Torino 2006, Patrick Singleton is more obsessed with his biceps and triceps than he is with throwing himself headfirst down an ice track.

The Winter Olympian is currently in the middle of his summer training regime with the British skeleton team ? and they are working him hard.

?I am looking pretty ripped now,? declared Singleton proudly after returning back to his University of Bath doom room after another exhausting day at the gym.

?They are working us very hard. We did the conditioning phase, then the strength phase and now we are on to the power phase before we do the speed stuff.

?It means lifting a lot of heavy weights but I am much faster and stronger than I have ever been before.?

Although you wouldn?t normally associate weightlifting with navigating a sled down a track at 100 mph, the strength and speed work is all to do with improving the push start ? traditionally the weakest part of Singleton?s armoury.

His driving skills are on a par with some of the best on the circuit but the time lost at the top of the track has always cost him dear, hence the time spent now being spent on the track and in the gym.

?This is all going to make a lot of difference when it comes to my racing times,? said Singleton, who won?t be back on the ice until October.

?Any time gained on the start makes a massive difference further down the track ? a slow start will mean you are out of contention in the race even before the first turn.

?Nowadays, the only way to compete is by putting in the long hours of summer training. We do work on technique three times a week but it is the speed and strength that I need to help me improve.

?If you have a good summer of training it often means you have a good winter of racing.?

In July, sliding coaches came in to sit down with Singleton and the British team ? who the Bermudian has linked up with for his pre-Olympic training ? to look at video footage and discuss techniques.

But for now Singleton, who only expects to get on to the track at Torino once more before next year?s Games, can?t think about sliding.

?At the moment there is little point in thinking about that side of things,? he continued.

?That will come in October when I get on the track and see how much difference all this training makes.

?For now I wake up in the morning and think about getting stronger and faster for skeleton and go to bed thinking about getting stronger and faster for skeleton.

?I can?t seem to get away from it. It is consuming me but that is the best way to be.

?Although luge (the discipline in which he competed in two other Games) required different training, I don?t ever remember being this focussed so far ahead of an Olympics.

?It is too early to think too much about medals at the Olympics themselves, but I can certainly say I am very happy with the way things are progressing.

?I linked up with the British coaches because they were supposed to be the best in the world and it certainly feels like they are.?