FORMER Olympic champion Lord Sebastian Coe has launched a training centre that will play a key role in the 2012 Games.

The peer, who won gold and silver medals in the 1,500m and 800m at the 1980 and 1984 Olympics, unveiled a plaque at the £2.5 million Tonbridge Centre for Sports and Media at Tonbridge School.

The centre will be marketed to potential Olympic teams as a training venue for athletics, hockey, fencing, archery and modern pentathlon.

Lord Coe, chairman of the 2012 London Organising Committee, was accompanied by several dignitaries ,including Lord Moynihan , the chairman of the British Olympic Association.