British athletes have competed at every Summer Olympic Games in the modern era, alongside Australia, France and Greece, though Great Britain is the only one to have won at least one gold medal at all of them.

[3] Team GB, organised by BOA, sent a total of 541 athletes, 279 men and 262 women, to the Games, and won automatic qualification places in all 26 sports.

Among the nation's medalists were taekwondo jin Jade Jones, triathlete Alistair Brownlee, and slalom canoers Etienne Stott and Tim Baillie, who won Great Britain's first Olympic gold medals in their respective disciplines.

Hoy also tied for the most total Olympic medals for a Briton with road cyclist Bradley Wiggins, who won the gold in the men's time trial.

[9] The day saw the team win 6 gold medals, starting in the rowing for Alex Gregory, Tom James, Pete Reed and Andrew Triggs Hodge in the men's coxless four and Katherine Copeland and Sophie Hosking in the women's lightweight double sculls, followed in the cycling by Dani King, Joanna Rowsell Shand and Laura Trott in the women's team pursuit.

[10] With Team GB attempting to build on their previous successes in Beijing four years earlier, expectations prior to the London Olympics were very high with the additional advantage of competing with home support.

This included a team of experts invited by BBC Radio 5 live, which implied an estimated total of 95 medals: 27 gold, 25 silver and 43 bronze.

"[19] The BOA selected a team of 541 athletes, 279 men and 262 women, to compete in all sports after gaining automatic qualification places in their respective events.

The BOA by-law preventing the selection of athletes sanctioned for anti-doping rule violations was struck down by the Court of Arbitration for Sport in April 2012, allowing the participation of Dwain Chambers, David Millar and Carl Myerscough.

[22] In addition to the Olympic merchandise, a range of Team GB branded items went on sale including the BOA's official mascot Pride.

Note that reserves for fencing, field hockey, football and handball are not counted as athletes: As the host nation, Britain automatically received the full allocation of six individual places, alongside entry to both the men's and women's team events.

[25][26] Former medalist Alison Williamson competed in her sixth consecutive Summer Olympics, becoming only the third British athlete to do so, but failed to move past the first round.

As a result, Sharp's inclusion meant the exclusion of four other runners that had achieved the 'A' standard, including 2011 European Athletics Indoor Championships gold medallist Jenny Meadows.

[30] Gareth Warburton was initially not selected for the 800 metres, having failed to achieve the 'A' qualifying standard at the 2012 European Athletics Championships in Helsinki, but was granted a place at the Games following an appeal.

[32] Paula Radcliffe was initially chosen as part of the squad for the women's marathon but withdrew on 29 July due to injury; Freya Murray was called up as her replacement.

[33] Welshman Dai Greene was selected to captain the athletics squad, reprising a role he had first served at the 2011 European Team Championships in Sweden.

Pre-event favourites Farah in the 10,000 metres, Jessica Ennis in heptathlon, and the world leading, but slightly less favoured Greg Rutherford in the long jump, won 3 gold medals for Great Britain in the space of 49 minutes on the middle Saturday of the Games.

[53] On the track the men's sprint team of Chris Hoy, Jason Kenny and Philip Hindes set new world records in both the first round and again in the final against France as they won the gold medal.

On 18 June 2012, British Cycling confirmed two accredited 'P' places – sprinters Ross Edgar and Becky James – essentially, substitute riders officially selected for the Olympic squad in the event of injury or illness.

Great Britain automatically received a team and the maximum number of individual competitors in each of the 3 disciplines; dressage, eventing and show jumping.

On 24 March 2012, Richard Kruse won a qualifying event in Copenhagen, thus earning Team GB a ninth quota place in men's foil.

[68] Head Coach: Danny Kerry Reserves: Bronze Great Britain men's football team competed at the Olympics for the first time since 1960.

[71] Former England captain David Beckham, who was involved in promoting London's bid to host the Games, had expressed an interest in appearing as one of the three over-23 players in the squad.

Butland, a late injury replacement for the Euro 2012 team, did not play in the tournament as England's third goalkeeper, and was allowed to keep his Olympic roster spot.

However an agreement between British Gymnastics and the BOA stipulated that the team had to reach a target score (45.223) at a test event held in London in January 2012.

[104] Head coaches: Jesper Holmris, Vigdis Holmeset British judoka received one place in each of the 14 categories by virtue of hosting the Olympic tournament – the maximum allocation possible.

[112][113] In the heats of the women's coxless pair, Helen Glover and Heather Stanning set a new Olympic record with a time of six minutes 57.29 seconds.

** Competed in the heats only As the host nation, Great Britain will have a squad of 9 synchronised swimmers taking part in both the duet and team events.

[123] Britain did not take any formal part in qualification tournaments in taekwondo, as the GB team already had four guaranteed places at their disposal, two for men, two for women.

[128] Great Britain did not have any other players with a sufficiently high world ranking to qualify automatically, and therefore applied for a number of wildcard places in the men's and women's draws.