Unofficial sport-by-sport guide - Medal calendar - Full results - The Big 4 - Team sports
CYCLISTS Sir Chris Hoy, Jason Kenny and Philip Hindes set a new world record to give Great Britain a fantastic start in the velodrome at the London 2012 Olympics.
The trio won the team sprint in 42.600, beating their own marker of 42.747 from the previous round to crush France in the final of the team sprint.
This truly stunning victory in a wonderfully raucous atmosphere means Hoy has now equalled Sir Steve Redgrave's overall Olympic gold haul of five and, in fact, the Scot has six medals at the Olympics in his career.
A chance of a seventh medal will come on Monday in the individual sprint - and a top-three finish there would see him join the brilliant Bradley Wiggins as Britain's most decorated Olympian.
Wiggins, who only last month won the most gruelling of contests - the Tour de France - stormed to time trial gold on the streets of London yesterday.
Despite falling behind early on, the 32-year-old kept his cool to finish in 50 minutes 39 seconds, ahead of German Tony Martin.
Only Swiss threat Fabian Cancellara followed the Londoner out of Hampton Court Palace but he finished almost three minutes off the pace in seventh.
And, if Wiggins' success was somehow not enough to sate your appetite, his loyal GB and Sky team-mate Chris Froome picked up an excellent bronze.
Britain was on a roll. Indeed, earlier on day five, the gold rush had officially begun when Helen Glover and Heather Stanning won in the women's pair at Eton Dorney rowing lake.
Theirs was also a historic gold. Not only was it the first British gold of London 2012 but it was also the first British gold in Olympic rowing history by female competitors.
It was a remarkable success, and the story behind Glover and Stanning is something of an Olympic dream.
An unlikely partnership, they were brought together after Glover joined Royal Artillery officer Stanning after picking up an oar for the first time in 2008.
Little was expected of the pair when they were set up but they showed their potential last year by winning world silver before embarking on a year-long unbeaten run. Rather wonderfully, it has all culminated in Olympic gold.
Minutes after Glover and Stanning had finished, they were almost joined at the top of the podium by the men's eight.
The eight took on a German team which had not lost in four years, and the Great British boat - which included 40-year-old Greg Searle - actually led at the half-way stage.
Everything had been put towards winning gold and so it was perhaps no surprise that they faded in the last 500m. Both the Germans and Canada took advantage - though at least the GB crew could console themselves with bronze.
Indeed, it was a complete sea-change from the first four days of competition during Team GB 'only' took two silvers and two bronzes.
Nevertheless, those early medals were hugely impressive and should not be understated. Rebecca Adlington could not defend her 400m freestyle title but she did take bronze despite qualifying a lowly eighth.
Better still, the Mansfield-born swimmer is considered to have a much better chance for gold in defending her other Olympic title, the 800m freestyle on Friday.
In the gymnastics, the men's team produced the best result for Britain since 1912 in the all-round event, taking bronze.
And, in the three-day eventing, Great Britain went one better than four years ago in Beijing by winning a team silver.
There was a nice touch when Zara Phillips was awarded her medal by her mother Princess Anne, herself an Olympian in 1972.
However, the highlight from those early stages was Lizzie Armistead just being pipped to gold in the women's road race by Dutch rider Marianne Vos. "Elizabeth the Second" was clever reaction in The Times to Britain's first medal.
Elsewhere, though, the British press could be seen as less kindly after Armistead's fellow-cyclist Mark Cavendish missed out on what had been seen as a dead-cert medal on day one.
On Monday, the Sun urged the public not to be too downhearted or panicky - but, by Tuesday, its own front page seemed to ignore that advice. "Wanted: Gold Medal" was its demand.
Meanwhile, the BBC, which has otherwise provided excellent coverage on television and online, and the Guardian both published articles agonising over when Britain would break its duck.
In fairness to the Guardian, it also published a data blog which compares Britain's record of achievement to the Olympics of four years ago.
Those statistics show that, even in the first few days of London 2012, Britain was not far behind matching its historically excellent result in Beijing. Now Team GB is actually doing better in terms of medals.
Day five was the breakthrough which the Sun demanded as, with Michael Jamieson's silver in the 200m breaststroke adding to the aforementioned success of Wiggins and Glover/Stanning, the complexion of the medal table has certainly changed.
It has only just got even better today. But, while the sixth day may have ended in the velodrome, it all began again back at Eton Dorney where the men's lightweight four held off Denmark to take silver.
Later in the afternoon, Britain scored an even greater success on the water in the canoe slalom.
Incredibly, both Tim Baillie/Etienne Stott and David Florence/Richard Hounslow finished ahead of Slovakian triple Olympic champions Peter and Pavol Hochschorner in a 1-2 at the Lee Valley White Water centre. It could not have been more perfect.
Around the same time as that, Great Britain was also winning gold in the shooting as Peter Wilson held his nerve with his final shot in the double trap before sinking to his knees.
Wilson's victory was exactly the sort of personal moment which the Olympics were made for - and there was a similar feeling at the ExCel Exhibition Centre in the judo.
For, while Gemma Gibbons lost in the final to American Kayla Harrison, her silver medal far exceeded her own expectations in an otherwise disappointing British judo campaign.
Elsewhere at the Olympics, China has led the medal table since the first very day with success in a wide array of sports including swimming, gymnastics, diving, fencing, shooting, table tennis, and weightlifting.
However, it has not all been plain sailing for the Chinese. In the pool, double gold medallist Ye Shiwen was suspected of cheating by senior USA coach John Leonard after her world record in the 400m individual medley.
"History in our sport will tell you that every time we see something, and I will put quotation marks around this - 'unbelievable'. History shows us that it turns out later on there was doping involved," said coach Leonard.
But his speculation is currently groundless on the basis that Ye has never tested positive for banned substances. Meanwhile, Leonard's case was hardly helped by British Olympic Association chairman Colin Moynihan who later backed the 16-year-old.
On a slightly separate note, what could not be denied was a disgraceful attempt by four pairs to rig the women's doubles badminton competition.
All eight players - two pairs from South Korea, and one each from China and Indonesia - have been disqualified after playing deliberately badly so as to avail an easier draw in the knockout stage.
Gail Emms, the retired British silver medallist from the Athens Olympics in 2004, blamed the introduction of a round-robin for the scandal, suggesting that such a format is simply unsuitable for a racket sport.
Nevertheless, the failure of some of badminton's finest to adhere strictly to Olympic values has been a rare black mark so far on the London 2012 Games.
Already there have been so many happy British memories, and my own impressions of the Olympics have also been really positive.
For, while I failed to get tickets for anything outside of the football, my personal Wembley début on Sunday was a moment to be cherished.
Surrounded by good friends, I saw Daniel Sturridge cap a 3-1 win over the United Arab Emirates with a brilliant chipped finish.
Then, yesterday at St James Park, a young Brazil team entertained on their way to beating New Zealand 3-0 and topping Group C.
That result means the Brazilians will return to Newcastle on Saturday for a quarter final against Honduras, and I will also be back to watch them.
The London 2012 Olympics have arrived and it is truly great to see them here. With the athletics, boxing and various team sport finals to come, it only promises to get even better!
MEDAL TABLE (End of Day 6)
| Rank | Country | G | S | B | Total |
| 1 | CHINA (CHN) | 18 | 11 | 5 | 34 |
| 2 | United States (USA) | 18 | 9 | 10 | 37 |
| 3 | South Korea (KOR) | 7 | 2 | 5 | 14 |
| 4 | France (FRA) | 6 | 4 | 6 | 16 |
| 5 | Great Britain & NI (GBR) | 5 | 6 | 4 | 15 |
| 6 | Germany (GER) | 4 | 8 | 5 | 17 |
| 7 | Italy (ITA) | 4 | 5 | 2 | 11 |
| 8 | North Korea (PRK) | 4 | 0 | 1 | 5 |
| 9 | Russian Federation (RUS) | 3 | 6 | 8 | 17 |
| 10 | Kazakhstan (KAZ) | 3 | 0 | 0 | 3 |
| 10 | South Africa (RSA) | 3 | 0 | 0 | 3 |
| 12 | Japan (JPN) | 2 | 6 | 11 | 19 |
| 13 | Netherlands (NED) | 2 | 1 | 3 | 6 |
| 14 | Hungary (HUN) | 2 | 1 | 2 | 5 |
| 15 | Ukraine (UKR) | 2 | 0 | 4 | 6 |
| 16 | Australia (AUS) | 1 | 7 | 3 | 11 |
| 17 | Romania (ROU) | 1 | 3 | 2 | 6 |
| 18 | Brazil (BRZ) | 1 | 1 | 2 | 4 |
| 19 | New Zealand (NZL) | 1 | 0 | 2 | 3 |
| 20 | Slovenia (SLO) | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| 21 | Lithuania (LIT) | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| 21 | Georgia (GEO) | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| 21 | Venezuela (VEN) | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| 24 | Mexico (MEX) | 0 | 3 | 1 | 4 |
| 25 | Canada (CAN) | 0 | 2 | 5 | 7 |
| 26 | Colombia (COL) | 0 | 2 | 1 | 3 |
| 26 | Cuba (CUB) | 0 | 2 | 1 | 3 |
| 28 | Sweden (SWE) | 0 | 2 | 0 | 2 |
| 29 | Mongolia (MGL) | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
| 29 | Belarus (BLR) | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
| 29 | Norway (NOR) | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
| 29 | Indonesia (INA) | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
| 29 | Spain (ESP) | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
| 29 | Denmark (DEN) | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
| 35 | Egypt (EGY) | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| 35 | Czech Republic (CZE) | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| 35 | Thailand (THA) | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| 35 | Chinese Taipei (TPE) | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| 35 | Poland (POL) | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| 40 | Slovakia (SVK) | 0 | 0 | 3 | 3 |
| 40 | Azerbaijan (AZE) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| 40 | Greece (GRE) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| 40 | Belgium (BEL) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| 40 | India (IND) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| 40 | Qatar (QAT) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| 40 | Serbia (SBR) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| 40 | Singapore (SIN) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| 40 | Uzbekistan (UZB) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| 40 | Moldova (MDA) | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
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