Home run for torchbearer Lord Coe (From Evesham Journal)

Home run for torchbearer Lord Coe

7:47pm Monday 25th June 2012 in National News © Press Association 2013

Lord Coe has carried the Olympic Torch through his home city and said: "There's nowhere else I'd rather be anywhere else in the world than here."

The double Olympic gold medallist said his welcome was "absolutely fantastic" as he ran a standard 300-metre torchbearer leg with the flame in the centre of Sheffield.

Crowds behind barricades on the city's Arundel Gate clamoured to get photos with the chairman of the London 2012 organising committee after he was dropped off by the relay bus and waited for his turn with the torch.

And as he shook hands with the sea of wellwishers, one woman said to him: "Thanks for doing all this for us".

Lord Coe said: "I'm just very, very flattered, very honoured. There's nowhere else I'd rather be anywhere else in the world than here with this torch today in Sheffield.

"Just having sat on the coach with 20 extraordinary people all telling their own personal stories of why they got nominated and some of the things they've done and been through - it's just extraordinary."