That's it, it's all over.

I finished my career with the roar of the home crowd behind me, captaining the most successful Scottish Gymnastics team ever as we claimed the silver medal, and was part of the most successful Team Scotland ever. It was exactly what I wanted.

The pre-Games preparation at the beginning of the month began with a three-week training camp down atLilleshall National Sports Centre. I had trained and lived down there when I was younger, but the last time I was there was four years ago when I made my decision not to go to Delhi so on the six-hour drive down I had mixed emotions.

However, as soon as I arrived I felt 19 again. It was great not to have to think about anything other than gymnastics. Every morning I would have a monstrous healthy breakfast, then put in a good three-hour morning session, the first hour of which was simply stretching and doing rehabilitation exercises. Then it was off to lunch to refuel for another three-hour session in the gym, including a 45-minute strength and conditioning session. After all that it was straight to the ice bath for 10 minutes, and on to a sauna for 25 minutes. Then we headed to dinner to fuel up and prepare for the next day.

I had never before been this rigorous with my prehabilitation and recovery, but I was rooming with Frank "The Tank" Baines for the three weeks and after spending five minutes with that boy he inspired me. Even though he is nine years my junior I learned so much from him. I have never seen someone so young be so professional. Anything he could do to better himself he would do without hesitation.

In the first week I told him that Green Tea was really good for you because it is loaded with antioxidants and later that day I walked into our room to see he had bought a box for the week. Even though he hated the taste he religiously drank three cups a day.

I was sold. If Frank was doing it I was too… He was a fan of compression kits, which promote circulation so more oxygen can pass through the muscles speeding up the recovery process and reducing muscle soreness, so I followed suit, although it cost me about £120 for only five weeks' use.

The ice baths were the worst thing: submerging my whole body into icy water up to my neck was not enjoyable. I couldn't breathe properly, my fingers and toes where in pain and my body would start to shiver after about five minutes, moving the water around me and making it feel even colder.

It was all worth it, though, and after three weeks intensive training I had never felt better.

We moved to the Athletes' Village on the Friday before we started competing on the Monday. Missing the opening ceremony was a shame but the competition was more important and nothing was going to hamper our training.

Village life is surreal. You suddenly become part of a family that is 350 strong; everyone is rooting for you and you for them. We settled in quickly and tried to make our room as we would normally have it. I was sharing with Daniel Purvis, Dan Keatings and Frank.

Dan Keatings had bought a projector so beds where shifted out the way so we could play our computer consoles on the 120inch screen in our darkened room on our down time.

The buzz after the medal haul early on inspired the rest of Team Scotland and by the time we went to compete Scotland were ready to beat the medal target. I will say forever that it was us, the men's gymnastics team, that secured the 34th medal, even if technically we were not given the medal until later in the day.

On the day of competition there were some nerves in the warm-up hall but that was always to be expected. This is when I had to do my job as captain - to ease the tension with banter and also to get out there and show them it could be done. I was put up first on all pieces that I competed on because I had been there and done it all before.

I felt very comfortable waiting outside of the arena, savouring every second knowing that I would never again walk out centre-stage in front of 10,000 people willing me to be great.

Walking out into the arena was like walking into a thunderstorm. The noise was all-consuming; even thinking about it now, I can feel my heart beating stronger and the adrenalin running through my arms. Walking around the arena to the pommel horse and seeing all the Saltires flying in the crowd was amazing.

I warmed up and stood on the podium waiting for the green light. The light came on, I heard Lisa, the announcer, say: "From Scotland, Adam Cox," and as I stood holding the handles preparing to mount, the crowd cheered so loud that I could feel the whole podium vibrate. I tightened my grip on the handle and told myself: "You've got this".

The routine, while basic, was as clean as could be, and then I had to get the crowd going and get the rest of the boys ready. During the two days of the team competition I was very pleased with my performances and even managed to make the vault final, when my second vault had the least deductions from the whole competition, 0.4.

As a team we had some falls and mistakes: that is to be expected when competing at such a high level with such high difficulty skills, but we did enough to secure a historic team silver medal and I was delighted with what we had achieved.

As for me, I'm looking forward to going back into the school I teach in and showing all the children what can be achieved if you work hard enough for it, spending time with my beautiful wife Kim, and preparing for the arrival of the new member of the family.

The last two years has been an emotional rollercoaster and I have pushed my physical and mental limits to braking point to compete at this Games. I was asked the other day if I would I go through it all again. I laughed and said: "Are you mad? Of course I would. Just have to run it by Kim first …"