AN East Lancashire Olympian has bared all for a magazine series which celebrates athletes’ bodies.

Sophie Hitchon, who is the British hammer record holder, stripped off for Sport Magazine’s Sport Uncovered series.

The series, launched in 2015, aims to reveal sportsmen and women as they have never been seen before.

The Blackburn Harrier, who won a bronze medal at the Rio Olympics last year, is featured swinging the hammer.

She also describes the training process for a champion hammer thrower.

Sophie, who comes from Burnley, said: “Around 90 per cent of our training is throwing. It is different to other track and field events, which you can’t do every day.

“In javelin, there is a lot more impact on the shoulder, knee and elbow – more force going through the body all at once.

“With the hammer, the throw involves more of a gradual build-up.

“Rhythm is key to whether it will go far. Some days you just don’t have the timing.”

She said hammer throwers don’t focus much on the upper body in training and it is all about building power in the lower body.

“That means we do a lot of squats and Olympic weightlifting such as clean and snatch – both of which are all about lower-body drive,” she said.

“You want the radius of the hammer to be as wide as possible and, if you’re really tight in your upper body, that becomes really difficult.

“Everyone’s always surprised when I tell them your arms don’t do anything in the throw – you just want them to be as relaxed as possible.”

It is not the first time Sophie has posed without clothes.

In 2015 she featured in the ‘Naked issue’ of Women’s Health where she was pictured swinging the hammer, naked on a tall building with the London skyline in the background.

At the time she described her thighs as as symbol of her success as an athlete. She said: “I put blood, sweat and tears into building them up.”