How 2012 can be white hot for the City

London volunteered to stage the Games at short notice because the intended hosts, Rome, were coping with an eruption by Mount Vesuvius.

The fourth Olympics at the newly-built White City Stadium featured 2,000 athletes and lasted six months with both summer and winter sports on the schedule.

Perhaps most saliently for organisers of the 2012 Games, it turned a small profit on an operational budget of just £15,000.

"They got a lot of things right in a short space of time," said Coe. "It was a sea change in the way the country got behind the Games.

"White City Stadium [which made way for BBC offices 30 years ago] went on to be the home of British athletics for decades."

The 1908 Games were not without controversy. The American team failed to show due deference to the King at the opening ceremony while Italian marathon "winner" Dorando Pietri was disqualified for being helped over the line.

But Coe hopes London 2012 will prove as popular as 1908 when 250,000 lined the streets to watch the marathon run from Windsor Castle to the main stadium.

To mark this year's centenary, the British Olympic Association have organised a rerun of the Great Britain versus Ireland polo final and the 1908 rugby final will be commemorated when the Barbarians take on Australia at Wembley stadium.

London came to the rescue of the Olympic movement a second time in 1948 to end a 12-year hiatus caused by World War II.