A group of schoolchildren stand on the track in Battersea Park wearing oversized white T-shirts and listening intently to their instructions. They split into groups and prepare for a relay race. “Hey, this team’s the lucky one,” says Jeanette Kwakye, “you’ve got me on your team.”

The kids are different shapes and sizes, some naturally athletic, others less so, but they are enthusiastic, just glad to be out of a classroom on a perfect spring afternoon. The session, one of a number of “taster” classes funded by the national lottery, is over all too soon. Kwakye’s team is not so lucky and comes second. “I hope that’s not an omen for the season,” she says later.

At 5ft 3in, Kwakye is barely bigger than some of the children and her running style is more hustle than elegance, but her message to the eager faces in front of her is simple and heartfelt: enjoy it and do your best. Kwakye’s best, last season, produced a surprise appearance in the final of the Olympic 100m, the first by a British woman for 24 years. Sucked along by the power of the Jamaicans, who swept the medals, Kwakye recorded a personal best time of 11.14sec, a result that was way beyond her expectation.

Now comes the hard part. Barely two strides separate the East Londoner from her first sub-11sec 100m and an indelible place in the record books. In sprinting, two strides may as well be a mile. “You’re right, yeah, but I still look forward to being the first GB woman to hit that mark and I’ve been working on it all through the winter, doing a lot of junk work on the track,” she says. Junk work? “You know, round and round and round, endurance stuff, putting in the miles.”

She didn’t tell the kids about the junk work, but since leaving her job with Rimex Metals, her most loyal sponsor, nearly 18 months ago to become a full-time athlete it’s the hard yards that have proved most testing and most rewarding.

Kwakye’s parents were born in Ghana and came to England in the early 1980s, but Jeanette is a Londoner through and through, “a bit of an urban city girl”, as she says. Her route from home to her training centre in Lea Valley takes her past the Olympic complex where, in just over three years, all the junk work will be put to the ultimate test.

Coming out of Beijing as one of the top six sprinters in the world — and the best in Europe — has raised Kwakye’s profile dramatically, but it also raised expectations, not least her own.

“I came back from Beijing with a reputation for progressing and I want to keep that up,” she says. “So I’ve got to be careful this season. The temptation is to come out and give it a go right away, but I have to be ready, so I’m going to keep it low key for the early part of the season.”

Part of her winter training was spent in Florida, working alongside the legendary Merlene Ottey, one of Kwakye’s many heroes. Ottey is 49 now, pretty well the same age as Kwakye’s mother, but she still trains like a 20-year-old. “It was an absolute honour to meet her and train with her,” says Kwakye. “At the time I had a few niggles and she just told me to be patient, that I was still young so not to rush it. To hear that from her meant a lot.” Kwakye had her picture taken with the great Jamaican. “She towered over me, but, hey, the Olympic champion (Shelly-Ann Fraser) is shorter than me, so I’m in good company.”

In fact, Kwakye was the third smallest of the 100m finalists. She’s checked. The question now is whether the pocket-sized Kwakye, a natural 60m indoor sprinter, can add sustained mid-race power to her explosive speed off the blocks. If so, an Olympic medal is well within her grasp and British women’s sprinting will have the role model which it has lacked for a generation.

Kwakye grew up watching Gail Devers and the succession of great and glamorous American sprinters, but she is now acting as a mentor for a new crop of young British sprinters who are promising to push her all the way to the startline in London 2012: Ashlee Nelson, Shaunna Thompson, Joey Duck, Asha Philip and Jodie Williams, all still in their teens. Nelson, in particular, a world junior silver medallist and a reserve for the relay team in Beijing, is certainly one to watch.

“I mother them all a bit,” says Kwakye. “But they’ve got to find out for themselves what it’s all about. They’ve all got beautiful personalities, which helps. A few years ago, we were asking where all the female sprinters were, well here they are. They’ll keep me on my toes, for sure.”

Perhaps, in 10 years from now, the next British Olympic sprinter will trace their dreams back to a sunny afternoon at the Millennium Arena in Battersea and a girl with an infectious laugh and a zest for life who was on their team.

“Who knows?” says Kwakye. “It might trigger some magic for one or two of them.”