“Put that in the paper,” Britain’s most outspoken athlete said. “Jess Ennis has a big a***.” This is a joke and the torrential rain had disguised the words “arms”, but Kelly Sotherton had plenty to say about her rivals and bum deals. She thinks her sport has received one, but then said she would welcome back Dwain Chambers, a drugs cheat, into the British fold. “I’m controversial,” she added.

She invited accusations of rank hypocrisy in saying that. Last year, at the World Athletics Championships, Sotherton pointed the finger of suspicion at Lyudmila Blonska, the Ukrainian who denied her a silver medal and thereby forced Ennis into fourth place. She repeated her accusations yesterday, asking how a woman could serve a two-year drugs ban and improve her heptathlon score by 500 points during her exile.

But Chambers tested positive for tetrahydrogestrinone (THG), completed a two-year ban in 2006 and was reduced to a pariah as he tried to launch an American football career in Germany. He will not be making a comeback at a Southern Counties indoor event at Lee Valley in North London this weekend, as reported by some, but the potential for a credibility-sapping return remains. So how can Sotherton marry her antidrugs stance with a pardon for Chambers?

“I think the difference is, Dwain stuck his hand up and admitted he cheated,” she said. “Someone like Marion Jones lied for years and stole money and medals. And Dwain did not go away and improve his 100 metres time from 10.4 to 9.8. I think he’s probably learnt his lesson.”

It was a flimsy defence that lends ammunition to the sport’s detractors. She was surely advocating one rule for the British and another for foreign cheats. “I can’t condone him, but I do respect him for coming out and saying he cheated,” Sotherton said.

His crime, though, means that even athletes such as Sotherton, 31, are tainted by suspicion. “At Lee Valley at Christmas there was a coach who was so bitter that he said 95 per cent of medallists are on drugs,” she said. “That meant he was accusing me, he was accusing Nicola Sanders. You can’t say that, but I realise that in other countries they’re probably saying, ‘That Nicola Sanders is on drugs.’ They’ll be saying, ‘They let that Chris-tine Ohuruogu off.’ But with Blonska she was banned, had a baby and came back with a much better score. I don’t understand that.”

Other views offered during this training camp for British athletes in South Africa were equally colourful. Ennis, she said will be a world and Olympic champion before becoming a successful hurdler. Carolina Klüft, the Swede who bestrides the heptathlon, is there to be beaten. Athletes went to the Sydney Olympics in 2000 for the sun and kit. “That’s changed,” Sotherton said. “I think we will have more finalists than ever in Beijing.”

As for herself, she will also compete in the long jump in Beijing and no longer throw the javelin “like a girl”. Her best at the event is 40.81 metres, but she was lamentably short of that last summer. Now, thanks to a foot injury that kept her sidelined for five weeks until mid-December, she says she has never been fitter or stronger.

“I’m in the best physical shape ever,” Sotherton said. “The injury [a swollen big-toe joint and bruising] could have ruined my year, but it’s been a massive blessing in disguise. I’ve changed all my training. With the javelin I’ve been working with a medicine ball. If I can get my PB [personal best], then that’s half the job done. I want to be in a position to win gold not bronze at the Olympics. I want six fantastic events and one good one.”

Next month Sotherton will meet Klüft in a three-event challenge in Bir-mingham, after which the Briton will target the World Indoor Championships, where she says she can achieve a world record in the pentathlon. The Olympics, though, is her priority. Having split from her long-term boyfriend, she says she can now be selfish. “It’s been a rough few months, career-wise and personally, I’ve got no distractions other than my four cats.”

She is counting the days to Beijing. She looked at her watch, noted the date and said: “This time next year I could be the Olympic champion.”