Phillips Idowu, the hot headed, brilliant, British triple jumper is getting ready to take gold at the World Championship Athletics this weekend. He is also in the middle of a huge bust up with the UK Athletics head coach, Charles van Commenee. The pair aren’t speaking – which, in sporting circles, is equivalent to not talking to your bride-to-be just before the wedding.

It is all due to Phillips’s over-enthusiasm on Twitter, and is proving a major to distraction to everyone – apart from the great man himself.

“No I’m not in the least bit distracted – I’m here to win” he said.

And here’s the punchline:

“I’ve done all the hard work, put in the long hours and practised harder than anyone. No-one sees all the stuff you do in the winter, but this is where it all comes together, where it all pays off.”

Which puts me in mind of pension funds. If you put in the long hours and went through the governance and crisis management drill during the “winter”, the current market troubles will not prove a significant distraction from the task in hand – getting fully funded for the least amount of risk.