Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ

It's been my first Olympics and while I'm disappointed not to get a medal, it's been a fine line all the way.

Let me start by putting straight earlier today.

I was cheesed off with my performance and then went straight into interviews. Sometimes you say stuff in the heat of the moment which you otherwise wouldn't.

I always said I wanted to compete in the Olympics and finish with a smile on my face and I didn't do that, but now I've been to the gym for an hour, I've had time to reflect a bit more.

Our coach Peter Suk has had a lot of time for me and a lot of belief in my ability, although sometimes I want him to be a bit more enthusiastic about me.

But I can't complain about the support he has given us - and it's me standing on the line shooting the arrows. We'll have a review in the weeks after the Olympics, but this has been one huge learning curve for us all.

There's been a few ups and downs for me personally from the opening qualifying for the team event to beating the Athens Olympic champion in the individual event.

I started off well in the team competition last weekend but one bad dozen on the fourth end left me in 21st place, but it was my best score of the season so far so I was happy with my performance.

There was a tricky crosswind which was difficult to read making things even harder, but to give you some idea of the level of competition, my score was one point better than I shot in my last World Cup meet in France when I placed 12th.

A day of chilling out followed before the elimination rounds started and we lost 214-210 to China.

It was a disappointing finish, but the team has not shot together too many times this year and after a good year last year, there was a lot of expectation on us.

It was a good opportunity for us but it's a fine line between hitting the gold and slipping into the red.

I had a strange interlude when I went down to cheer on the British women in the individual event. Charlotte Burgess and Naomi Folkard met in the round of 32 and an extra coach was needed to offer moral support and sort out their arrows.

I was asked to help Charlotte out and although I've never done anything like it before, I did so.

but it was up to me to try and lift her spirits, as Naomi started to pull away.

Before the last end I just told her to shoot like they were the last arrows she was ever going to shoot in her life - it was a great privilege to be in that position and good experience.

It was then time to focus on my individual event on Wednesday - I only scored 103, but beat Italy's Mauro Nespoli in the first elimination round.

My score was not as good as team-mates Larry Godfrey and Simon Terry, but they both went out.

I wanted to do better in the next round, not just for myself, but for the whole team.

I faced the reigning Olympic champion Marco Galliazo, also from Italy in the next round and I put in a great performance, but I still needed a 10 from my final arrow to progress.

The adrenaline was really pumping and I just told myself that there was nowhere else the arrow was going, but in the centre gold.

I knew pretty much as soon as it left the bow that it was on target, but it was still a relief to see it go in and I won .

It was a brilliant feeling to beat the Italian and he told me that I had better go on and win the tournament now.

But then the day was over and I had a day off before going back for the last 16 round.

I was getting into a good rhythm on the Wednesday and I reckon I would have gone much further if the competition had continued.

That's not the way it works though and I had to come back today where I lost my first match against a Cuban 108-104.

It was hugely disappointing, but you win some and you lose some and I'm 95% sure I'll be back for London 2012.

First up though is to enjoy the rest of the Olympics, then it's home for a review with the archery team and then I plan to take a bit of break from the recurve and go back to the field archery and take part in the World Games next year.

I'll be back in a couple of weeks, though, to let you know about the rest of my Olympics experience and more on the future.

Alan Wills was talking to Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Sport's Peter Scrivener.