It's never nice to dwell on tragedies in sport but am I the only person left shaking his head at the number of deaths we've had this year?

The closing date for the Team South Africa mascot competition has come and gone and we look forward to the announcement of the winning entrant and of course the lucky winners who chose the winning mascot.

This week has been dominated by the inquiry into Cricket South Africa and by the end of Wednesday, the acting president, Mr AK Khan, had resigned.

Our visit to Parliament to brief the Sport Portfolio Committee was definitely the highlight of the week.

We're already almost into the third month of the year and I can report that the response from the athletes following our recent media conference in Johannesburg has been very encouraging.

At least three important events have kept me busy since my last feedback. First up, we celebrated 202 days out from the Paralympics with the British navy on the frigate HMS Montrose in Simon's Town.

Just recently I had the opportunity to travel to the University of Stellenbosch to visit our star long-jumper Luvo Manyonga and his coach Mario Smit.

There's no doubting that we are faced with an extremely tight programme for 2012, an Olympic Games year.

Isn't it great news to see that Sifiso Nhlapo, our Beijing 2008 Olympics BMX rider is on the road to recovery. I'm sure we all want to see a fully fit Sifiso on the starting line in London. There's no doubting that he inspires us all so much with his determination.

I knew it would arrive sooner rather than later but I'm still rubbing my eyes trying to believe that the Olympic year is upon us.