Meet the Oohs and Aahs (that's Olympians' other halves and athletes after hotties)

Unattached medal winners quickly learn that they're number one with the opposite sex. But it's a bit more complicated for those with significant others

Scott Brash, you've devoted years of your young life to the quest for Britain's first Olympic showjumping gold medal for six decades, and you've done it! What a phenomenal, amazing (insert more BBC-approved adjectives) performance. How do you feel?

"I really hope this win improves my pulling power with women, if I'm honest! That's about it."

How, well, honest. But perhaps we can forgive Brash's brashness. The Olympics have for a long time been known as an arena for one sport you won't find on the schedule. As US judoka Ronda Rousey and Olympics veteran said last month: "There's a lot of beautiful people... in the best shape of their lives... coming together in one village. My only advice... is condoms. Be safe people!"

The bar at the athletes' village may be dry, and those beds with the Olympic duvets may be single, but with London on the doorstep there's no holding back athletes with medals in their bags or sorrows to drown.

Ryan Lochte, the US swimming pin-up with the Hollywood looks was seen getting into – and drinking – the spirit of the Games in the early hours of Sunday. He looked suitably exhausted as he left London's Chinawhite nightclub accompanied by several women.

Earlier, Lochte had attempted to clarify a quote from his own mother, who had tried to explain her boy's single status: "He goes out on one-night stands. He's not able to give fully to a relationship because he's always on the go."

She meant "dates" rather than one-night stands, Lochte claimed. Yeah right! When he was asked earlier in the year about sex in the Olympic village, the swimmer said: "Hey, sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do."

Usain Bolt didn't leave the village to celebrate his 100m win, preferring to celebrate in his room with half of the Swedish handball team (and why not). Michael Phelps, too, has been flexing his dating muscles, appearing at a Kensington nightclub on Sunday, but the greatest swimmer of all revealed himself not to belong to the Olympic cruising team, but rather the "Games of other halves". He has been dating his companion, the American model Megan Rossee, for months.

Having a body and a bank balance like Lochte's can, one imagines, make dating easier than, say, swimming really fast, but for all the lust in the air at the Olympic village, the nicer moments have come with displays of longer-term affection.

We could imagine what sacrifices a Wag (or Hab) must make when Mo Farah's pregnant wife Tania joined the runner on the track for a sweaty hug after his already tear-inducing win in the 10,000 metres, or when Bradley Wiggins kissed his wife Catherine. After the hours of training Jessica Ennis had put in to win gold in the heptathlon on Saturday, her first priority was to walk the dog with her fiancé, Andy.

And on the same day Holly Bleasdale won sympathy for her emotional failure in the pole vault competition, we cooed when she revealed on Twitter that her boyfriend had proposed. It was, she said, an "epic day".

Whatever your romantic priorities at the Games, sometimes you can't win. Pity Kim Collins, the five-times Olympian and opening ceremony flag-bearer for St Kitts and Nevis. His lane in the 100m qualifiers was left empty because his home nation had banned him for sleeping with... his wife!