The Olympian attempt to stage the Games

For all the animated and keen speeches he has given about the Vancouver Olympics, John Furlong has a secret.

He almost breaks into a cold sweat whenever he has to make a public address. Churning stomach, dry mouth, jittery nerves, you name it, the head of the Vancouver Olympic managing board has experienced it over the course of the hundreds of addresses he's had to give over the last decade.

An powerfully private man, he hates to be the centre of concentration. And yet those speeches and the storytelling fervour with which he delivered them helped galvanize a Canadian public not familiar to showing overt partisanship. It was that loyalty, spilling over in the form of red mittens, flags hung in windows and an almost frivolous sense of public joy, that sparked Furlong to want to write about his experiences organizing the compound 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Games.