This summer is the Olympic games and I’m still in the running for that. I’m taking two years to do my first year and hopefully by next September I’ll have enough credits to start my thesis. I’m taking a bit longer to do my master’s studies. Finding the right place paid off because in July 2019 I won the World Championships Lightweight Women’s Single Scull in Sarasota, Florida. I thought, they clearly know what rowers are up to here. I also saw they had a special support scheme for elite athletes and the first thing I saw on the website was a girl in a single scull going down the Henley course in light blue colours. I found the sustainable energy technology course and thought it was amazing. I had one more year left in ‘Under 23s’ so it was important for me to find a place where I could combine my studies and train at the level that I wanted to compete at. In 2018 I won my first ‘Under 23’ World Rowing Championships medal. ‘I’ve never known anything but having to be organised and disciplined’ It was that and my love for De Lelie's ice cream that sold me on Delft in particular. I saw bikes everywhere and I’m a fanatical cyclist so I thought I could live here. It was my first time in the Netherlands and I loved it. A couple of days after that I came to visit Delft. I actually competed at the 2016 Junior World Rowing Championships in Rotterdam and won two medals. You do miss out on a lot of things, but it’s a choice. I love it and I certainly wouldn’t call it a sacrifice. But as I got to the end of my degree I was really struggling because it was a heavy degree (BEng, Exeter) and I train twice a day every day. I did my first three years of ‘Under 23’ (an age category in competitive rowing, Ed.) in the UK alongside my full-time studies in mechanical engineering. He saw a lot of potential in me and encouraged me to compete for Great Britain at the junior championships and he helped me through that. I started rowing back home in France and was very fortunate that the coach of the local club happened to be an Olympic champion. “I was born in the UK to British parents but was brought up in France.
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