A trip to Windsor's Leisure Centre with her 'overactive' brother when she was five led 20 years later to Mallory Franklin reaching her current position as an elite athlete training for next year's Olympics.

Mallory, 26, is one of 1,100 elite athletes on the National Lottery funded World Class Programme - training full-time for the 2021 Olympics.

She has already had a successful career as a slalom canoeist and in 2018 was Britain's most successful female canoeist after a record eight individual and three team medals in one season.

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Next year in Tokyo will mark her first Olympic games, after she was selected to race in the women’s canoe single (C1) class - the first time the event has been included in the games.

Mallory grew up in Birch Grove, Windsor near Homer School, which she attended before moving up to Dedworth Middle School and Windsor Girls.

She said: "I was five and my brother was a bit too active at school so we were taken to Windsor Leisure Centre, in the hope it would use up some of that energy."

They both fell in love with the river and she says: "I have never stopped since."

It has become a fulltime career for Mallory, thanks to being chosen for the Lottery funded World Class Programme.

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So how did she cope with the abrupt postponement of this year's Olympics?

She said: "That was not so bad because I tend to focus a month ahead and we knew about well in advence.

"What was stressful was wondering if I would have to go through the whole reselection process again for next year. I don't think I could have stood that. Thankfully we didn't."

Now she is focussed on bringing home medals next year when - fingers crossed - Olympics go ahead.

After that there is one more important milestone on the horizon, marriage to another keen canoeist - her boyfriend Ciaran - at Christmas, 2021. 

Since National Lottery funding started in 1997, Great Britain and Northern Ireland athletes have won 864 inspirational Olympic and Paralympic medals.

Discover the positive impact playing the National Lottery has on sport at www.lotterygoodcauses.org.uk and get involved by using the hashtags: #TNLAthletes #TracktoTokyo