London 2012 - get planning your journey NOW

I have spent a bit of time today trying to decide how we're going to travel to the Olympics and Paralympics.  I have been really impressed with the London2012 pages Getting to the Games and Spectator Journey Planner which have helped and provided lots of information about reduced price train fares into London and free London travel.  However the information about when to arrive at venues has been quite a shock.

• We have tickets for the Olympic Weightlifting
• It starts at 10am in the ExCeL stadium at Docklands 
• I assumed we'd need to be at the stadium an hour before the event started but the information on the website says to allow 2 hours to clear the security process and find your event
• So we need to be in Docklands at 8 in the morning
• It's at least one hour across London on tube and DLR on a normal day (I commuted that route for a year) so I reckon we need to leave an extra half hour with all the extra load on the system
• Working this out, we need to be at Paddington at 6.30am
• Which means catching a train from Reading by 6am
• We must leave home by 5.30am
• Whoa that's early.

Don't get me wrong, I always knew it would be a task and a half to get to the Olympics, but 9 hours travelling is quite something, especially with a 6 year old.  I know it'll be worth it, just to be part of this extraordinary experience, but I think I might plan in some quiet days before and after so we all have the energy to cope.

Oh and just so you know, the advice for getting through security at the Olympic Stadium is to allow 2.5 hours; it's definitely worth planning your journey NOW.