WEYMOUTH'S Bryony Shaw is compeating in the women's RS:X class at the Rio olympics.

Here she talks about her journey to the top of the sport.

How did it all start for you?

I first tried windsurfing aged nine. I’d always loved that sense of being able to float on water, even things like lilos on holiday. I was on a lake in France and I think it just came to me so naturally, I had such a great time it was like this sense of escape away from land. I remember having this beaming smile and I knew it was the sport for me.

As a child you love that sense of escapism and I think the sensations of the wind and the water and all the elements, I was just gliding along on a relatively light wind day on a lake, flat water, it was just a really nice sensual experience. That’s important for the first try of windsurfing. I think a lot of people think about big crashing waves and that sense of danger maybe, but my first experience was just really peaceful and fun.

How did it become serious for you?

When I discovered there was a competitive side, not just cruising on a lake, I very much enjoyed that sense of trying to win. I was always very sporty and competitive. There were so many different disciplines you could try out, but the racing really grabbed me and I remember aged 14 by the time I’d got a bit of racing under my belt I said to mum ‘I want to go to the Olympics’. I hadn’t even realized windsurfing was in the Olympics, so from that age it became a dream.

Do remembering at a certain point thinking ‘Oh I’m quite good at this’?

Definitely. Even the first week when I had a bit of instruction when we as a family went on holiday to west Wales and just in a week I managed to achieve my level three and I was aged 12. You see that everyone around you is very impressed and I just was so determined to achieve planing in the footstraps and harness and all these things that help you get that Level 3 BeachStarr and things like that, I think it was clear I had determination. From that centre, they were the ones who encouraged me towards the UK racing scene and once I was part of that I made so many friends of my age group and met so many likeminded people, the sport just draws you in.

How did that become Olympic sailing?

The RYA Youth programme was all those stepping stones for me. It was ‘right I want to get into the Youth team’ and ‘oh then I can be coached by so and so’ and or I can get a grant to the Worlds. All those little targets even as a young child I set myself the RYA was then setting me and when you achieve those you get that added support and even my local city council in Oxford was helping with grants and things. All that encouragement just pushes you along and you think this is all getting me to my dream goal. I feel so privileged and lucky that I’ve been able to make this sport my entire life’s dream and it’s a sustainable way purely down to the structure that I have around me, the UK Sport lottery funding, it labels us to be professional. In that way I’m completely indebted to the success of the Sydney and Athens Olympics that proceeded my first Games in Beijing as the success of those teams made sailing one of Britain’s top sports so we can get the level of support that we do.

What have been the inspirational moments or people throughout your career?

As a young girl I remember watching Denise Lewis at the Game, she had such a stunning physique, that sort of athleticism to me was just so attractive. As a young girl, that’s really something to aspire to. Then women within my own sport like Barbara Kendall, she achieved so much and was the first gold medallist at women’s windsurfing. She was such a character, she allowed me to train alongside her and those moments when training alongside these existing champions, I remember saying to mum ‘I’m on the same start line as Barbara Kendall’. Those kind of role models have just been really, really inspirational for my journey

What were you like at your first Olympics?

I was definitely a wide-eyed child. I felt like I was running a professional programme, I had all this support around me, I’d won the Test Event the year before, I had potential, it was going to be a light wind really physical challenge for windsurfing we’re pumping around the race course, so I was up for it. I prepared myself physically, I was lean, I was fit and I was surrounded by this star-studded team. We really had high expectations as a team and I was amongst it all. I just remember the first day we came back in the team bus and I was talking to Ben Ainslie and Sarah Ayton, asking ‘how was your day? I got a 2,1’ ‘oh I got a 2,1 as well’ and it was like ‘wow ok, that’s a good start’. Just little moments like that you have to pinch yourself I very much rode on their coattails, a youngster part of that really experienced team.

And then you won the bronze medal.

I was so pleased with a bronze medal, I had a chance of gold going into that final race, it was so close on points but when I crossed that finish line there was like a wave of excitement. I’d done it, the relief and I remember the tears started falling and I just wanted to go and congratulate my fellow medalists, the Italian and the Chinese girl, and celebrate with them and my coach. I remember embracing Dom Tidey, my coach, and just being so overwhelmed and then there was a camera and a microphone shoved under, ‘How do you feel?’. I just remember going ‘thanks to my mum and thanks to my coach’ and it just all flooded out like real spur of the moment stuff and they really captured that sense of excitement that I had. I think everybody back in the studio was giggling because they couldn’t believe there was this excitable girl, wow you know she’s so happy with her bronze medal. It’s quite a moment.

What about London and the build up to that?

It’s crazy talking about the emotions of Beijing and I feel that excitement inside me, then talk about London suddenly there’s this heaviness. It was so different and so disappointing. The setbacks I had in the build up with recurring pneumonia and things like that like, but you could be injured, you could have something disastrous happen through the week, there are so many of those kind of stories of athletes. You’re striving for perfection, you’re striving to achieve that expectation. For me as well I thought it was going be the last Olympics for windsurfing, my final last effort, so for that to be the last note on my career was really upsetting. It was in complete contrast to Beijing. When you have those moments that you feel devastated, disappointed it spurs you on, it gives you that added motivation. There’s no room for complacency, for injury, sickness, any of those things, and for the Rio campaign, for me, health and wellbeing has been so high on the agenda especially with the polluted water and things like that so it’s been a lot of lessons learnt from London

Has your approach or perspective changed since London?

I’ve got so much more self-belief. I really feel like I’m the driving force of my campaign. You know the sense of the young girl in Beijing riding on other peoples coattails? The support I have had from the Youth? I feel like that support is around me but I’m the one that’s the athlete on the water, I’m racing and decisions are made by me that can then be supported by the people around me. It’s very empowering and certainly as a female athlete that sense of empowerment really can make you stand taller, shoulders back, right I mean business. I feel that sense of responsibility for the team but really it’s my achievements and what I can do out there on the water, how I structure my campaign, what my priorities are each day so that’s the real step change for me this campaign, that I’m the driver of my bus.

Who is Bryony Shaw?

I think I’m an athlete with real determination and the empowerment with the experience I’ve had from my last two Games I’ve got such a will to win going to Rio. I think I’m quite a happy windsurfer, I like to go in there with a sense of enjoyment and that I cant be knocked around. No matter what the wind blows I think my competitors know I’ll be a contender and I can never be discounted. There’s that level of mutual respect across the fleet that we each have our super strengths but I’m friends with a lot of the girls in the fleet and it’s a really nice spirit to the windsurfing. A lot of us train alongside each other, and in the build up of the Games we will be doing our training alongside all the foreigners. That sort of friendliness and happy vibe I try to bring with when I’m on the water comes across but also that professionalism that I always give it 100% is what the other competitors see.

How all consuming is the gold medal in Rio?

It’s everything I’m striving for. Everyone knows you’re striving for gold, you just want to be able to not have any hiccups like health problems, equipment issues, whatever it might be. You just want to be able to go out there and perform your best, with no weird wind shifts or picking up some trash from the water in Rio stopping you in your tracks or making you fall in, you just want it to be a fair game. You want to put the best show on that week and as long as I feel I have done that then I’ll be happy. But ultimately the gold medal is what I’m striving for.

You’re being coached by Barrie Edgington this time around. How’s that been?

Barrie is a really, really experienced Olympic coach. He’s been involved with Nick Dempsey’s campaign in the past and what he’s brought to my campaign is a freshness and a sense of enabling, where he very much says ‘I’m supporting your programme’. It enabled me to be empowered with a driving force behind it all. I think his relief as a coach is I have really taken that on and really matured. As a team we ping pong really well and we work really hard on our communication on the water so that he can keep me that happy Bryony, and in that elevated state of alertness so that I can be a good information gatherer of all the different elements that Rio is going to throw at us. If you are in that zone and alert it’s very much a case of the coach taking a step back and just less is more and Barrie’s very good at that.

The culture of the team for Rio has shifted massively since London?

The makeup of the team is different there’s so much mutual respect across the team, we’ve got so many World Champions in the team, European Champions and when we discuss the venue or where those extra gains can come from that mutual respect across the team is vital and I think it’s really grown. I feel we’ve got a really steady pace as a team, there’s no one really who heads up the team. It will be Nick Dempsey’s fifth Olympics so he’s definitely the most experienced and then there’s Giles Scott, who is such a decorated athlete already, but it’s his first Games. There’s a broad range of experiences within the team but so much talent. Achievements such as Ali Young being World Champion, I just felt so proud of her, Nick Thompson just seems to be that wow we’re really a team that has. I think that mature level of the team, that real humble nature of the team, is really coming through. Hopefully when e come out of the Games that’s when we can hold our heads high.

What would it mean to you to make gold happen in Rio after the rollercoaster?

I feel like Rio is almost like another chance. When windsurfing was kicked out of the Games it was very much a huge for my direction and looking back on the highs of Beijing and the lows of London and the maturity of drawing on all those lessons learnt, I feel like Rio is my time to shine. I feel like I’m ready that that’s a good place to be. I don’t feel there’s a whole heap of pressure this time, maybe I felt more pressured for London. I feel I can go there and have fun and just try and put on the best show and I can only do my best. I’ve always known there’s a talent within me that as long as I’m hard working and focused I’ve been able to make things happen in my life. It’s that sense of achievement, of all of those years of ups and downs, hopefully culminating in being able to have something to cherish I feel is a sign of my journey, a sign of my dedication to the sport. A gold medal at the end would be something I’d cherish for the rest of my life and be extremely proud of.