With less than a year to go before the London Olympics reporter RACHEL CONNER talks to Petts Wood’s own Olympian Tom Solesbury to find out how training is going.

Petts Wood’s Tom Solesbury might have had a disappointing Olympic debut in Beijing, but the 31-year-old rower is hoping the home crowds in London will help spur him on.

Tom, who grew up in Petts Wood, was a keen athlete while at school at Ravenswood School in Bromley, but did not start rowing until he went to study law at Warwick university.

It was not until Tom moved to London to qualify as a solicitor that he started rowing more seriously and in 2006 he gave up his job to train full time after being selected for the world championships.

Now Tom is training with the British team in Reading and lives nearby with fellow GB rower Tom James.

Following an intense training programme, where athletes are only given one day off every three or four weeks, he does two or three training sessions a day, seven days a week.

He said: “To be honest I don’t really enjoy the training that much. I don’t enjoy having to get up early for training and pushing your body really hard everyday.

“But I love racing, especially when we do well. It’s definitely the best bit.”

“The biggest challenge can be getting the crew together. There are lots of athletes coming into boats and they have to gel together as a unit and sometimes have to make compromises as to what is best for the boat.”

After rowing competitively for four years, Tom was forced to switch to sculling after having to take eight months out of training last year to heal a shoulder injury. Now he hopes to scull in the Olympics next year and wants to make up for a disappointing competition in Beijing.

He said: “Beijing was difficult for me because I just missed out on the eight and got put into a pair at the last minute. We did quite badly, definitely not as well as I hoped.

“I’m hoping London will be better for me. Having it at home is going to be huge for our teams.

“It’s going to be packed out so the support will be massive. The atmosphere is going to be really special.

“I think there will be extra pressure to perform, though there is always pressure on any athlete at the Olympics.

"This is what we do, this is our job. If we can’t handle the pressure we don’t deserve to be there. Our team won’t see it as extra pressure but extra motivation.”