Brett Lee has embraced a new fitness program in a bid to peak at an age when most fast bowlers consider their best days are behind them.
An optimistic Lee, 32, insists the best could be yet to come as he plots a path towards taking more than 400 Test wickets and overtaking his idol Dennis Lillee (355 wickets) along the way.
The 310-wicket Test paceman, who was criticised for his one-wicket performance in the first Test against South Africa in Perth, has compared himself with an Olympic sprinter and is training like one with a program designed by the Australian team's fitness coach, Stuart Karppinen.
"I want to compare myself to an elite Olympic athlete," Lee said.
"The Olympic sprinters don't peak until they are 33 to 35 years old.
"That's the way I have been structuring my program with Stuart Karppinen.
"Olympic sprinters have a very similar make-up to mine as far as the fast-twitched fibres, the way that your body is structured.
"I don't see any reason that, when I have just turned 32, I can't improve on my pace. I am eyeing off 400 Test wickets.
"I would love to go past the great Dennis Lillee and (South African quick) Allan Donald, who was my idol growing up.
"That is a goal I have set myself."
Going into the Boxing Day Test, skipper Ricky Ponting has pledged a renewed show of faith in Lee after he was publicly critical of his spearhead quick in Perth.
Lee says he has no problems with Ponting's outburst.
- BEN DORRIES