Being an elite athlete comes with challenges but the cut in my funding in March 2021 was a blow. I was fortunate to receive an Athlete Performance Award when I started in 2017 with British Canoeing, and this meant I only needed to work one day a week, allowing me to focus on my training. The pandemic meant that the funding had been extended to allow us to compete, but as none of the events happened, I was suddenly facing the prospect of having to work full time and potentially put my training in jeopardy.
By some kind of miracle, a job came up at British Canoeing in their membership department, which meant it would be much easier to balance my training alongside working. What I didn’t expect was that I would still be working from home months later!