Morgan Bolding is hoping 2024 will finally be his year.
The Team GB rower has had his fair share of bad luck, but is hoping he can finally make an Olympic Games after Covid-19 helped dash his hopes four years ago.
The 29-year-old, who grew up in Cornwall and learned to row on the River Fowey, had been picked for the men’s eight at the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo before they were postponed because of the global pandemic.
But a year later, after spending time training on his own in his living room during lockdown, illness meant he missed out on selection for the rearranged Games 12 months later.
“I was a little bit unwell for the important testing period and I missed the part I needed to do and lost my opportunity to retain my seat,” he tells BBC South West.
“That was tough, but to be honest it was something I was prepared for and it really has driven me more this year because I take things as they come.
“It’s almost made me feel a lot more comfortable in the knowledge, even now when things are going well, that I might not end up going, but I will do everything I can to get there.”
Bolding is hopeful he can make the Paris games this summer. He is part of the men’s eight that has lost just one race over the past few years and won the European Championships last month.
“We have had a very good run into the last few years,” he says.
“Every step of the Olympiad is always teeing up for the Olympics, it feels like an achievement really because you’ve got that one goal at the end of the Olympiad looming over you and every step so far has gone really well.
“We’ve lost one race over the last few years and we’ve probably learnt from that as much as we would learn from the ones we won.
“We’re feeling good, we’re going well, I think it’s just about not losing our heads, and just because it’s an Olympic year trying to treat it the same as any other year, but just with that change at the end of the year.”
