Meridian torchbearers

Local residents and councillors have criticised LOCOG for giving so many Olympic torchbearer places in Oxfordshire to overseas runners backed by the Olympic Games' sponsors. The leader of Oxfords City Council, Bob Price, said it was "disappointing" news.

The London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games (LOCOG) say sponsors like Coca-Cola are important for funding.

The first groups of Paralympic torchbearers are to be named later today. The flame will be lit on 24 August to mark the start of the 2012 Paralympic Torch Relay celebrations.

Nominations for torchbearers were considered between May and June 2011 and people were chosen after selection panels met in the Autumn. Tens of thousands of people were nominated, and 8,000 will be confirmed as torchbearers before the relay begins.

Eight thousand people have been nominated by people they know to carry the Olympic flame across the UK. In the South East, it will bass through major locations including Brighton, Dover and Canterbury.

Adventurer and polar explorer Manley Hopkinson has been named today as one of the seven thousand Olympic torchbearers. He got the news by email at his home in Lymington in the New Forest - where he's preparing for his next Antarctic expedition - after his name was put forward by friends.

Manley, who's previously conquered the world's toughest yacht race - the BT Global Challenge, and set a record time for the Polar Race - the first ever race to the Magnetic North Pole, says he's been left humbled by the thought of carrying an Olympic torch.

Manley will run a leg of the torch's journey around Britain before it arrives at the Olympic Stadium in London for the start of the games on July 27th. We caught up with him in Lymington and asked him how he's preparing for such an historic duty.