Off track ...

STAMPS OF APPROVAL

Britons are busy celebrating their record Olympic gold medal haul, but some are working harder than others to mark the occasion.

Spare a thought for the staff at Britain's Royal Mail, who are working overtime to rush out special next-day stamps for each of the six gold medals won by British athletes on Saturday.

The Royal Mail has promised fans that a celebratory stamp will be issued within 24 hours of each British gold medal win.

AT THE GATES

Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates and his wife, Melinda, stopped by Horse Guards Parade on Saturday night to watch Misty May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh Jennings dismantle the Netherlands in straight sets in beach volleyball.

Asked what he thought of the Americans' performance, Gates told The Associated Press: "It was fantastic".

Gates is a bit of a beach volleyball groupie, it turns out. He says he went to see matches "at Bondi and Beijing". May-Treanor and Walsh Jennings won the gold medal in 2008 in Beijing but were not a team at the Sydney Games, when the competition was held at Bondi Beach. They won their first at Athens in '04.

MORE EXPLANATION

The Chinese team on Saturday demanded an explanation from the world cycling ruling body UCI on the relegation of the Chinese to silver medal.

The Chinese beat their German rivals in the women's team pursuit final on Thursday, only to be relegated to second place.

The Chinese team reviewed the race video, saying they didn't violate any rules of the sport. China's coach Daniel Morelon said the referees "robbed" his athletes of a gold medal.

The Chinese team's appeal was rejected, and it was fined for the intrusion into the referees' area.

Pan Zhichen, the Chinese cycling team chief, filed a written complaint to UCI President Pa Maquade on Saturday, demanding an explanation on "why the Chinese cyclists were relegated to silver medal".

Pan said his team would not pay the fine, saying Chinese team members were escorted into the referees' area by UCI officials.

GETTING THERE IS A BEAR

An honorary member of the International Olympic Committee, International Weightlifting Federation president Tamas Ajan, said he's impressed with the London Olympics by and large but not satisfied with transportation and the television coverage.

"I'm impressive by the Games. But there are some problems with the transportation." he said. "There is very crowded traffic and very heavy traffic jams. Yes the organizing committee gave us Oyster cards so we can use public transportation freely. But you can see we usually have to walk a long way - about 25 or 30 minutes from the underground station to the venue. That's a little bit difficult.

"I'm also a little disappointed with the television channels," he said. "Usually at an Olympic Games, you can have five or six channels, at least, to watch the Olympic competitions. But I can only have one channel in my hotel, BBC1. The problem is it only televises the British athletes. OK, we can watch at the restaurants, but I can still only see one channel because everybody is watching the same channel.

China Daily-Xinhua-AP