Freyja Prentice is gearing up for the most important few months of her life - as she seeks to make the GB team for London 2012.

At 21, the Inverurie modern pentathlete is managing fine - she is currently the world's top-ranked junior.

Norwegian-born, she also holds the unique distinction of placing in the top ten at EVERY senior World Cup event she has attended.

But there are no guarantees. Only two girls will make the GB team next year and Prentice is competing against fellow-Scot Mhairi Spence and England's Heather Fell, silver medallist in Beijing, and a queue of others.

And she knows all about their strengths and weaknesses as she trains with them full-time on a daily basis at Bath University.

"It's only natural instincts to look at the strengths and weaknesses of the girls you're training with as you know in the back of your mind, that you're also competing against them for an Olympic place," Prentice admits.

"You look at them when they're having good days and it can be worrying but they can also have bad days. But I can have good and bad days myself.

"We're all very competitive and, with nine girls training together, it's going to be complex. But we all get on very well and socialise outside training.

"We all know most of us will be disappointed when it comes to the Olympics but it's never talked about.

"I think we all inspire each other - we're training every day with an Olympic silver medallist and that's inspiring in itself.

"To make the Olympic team would mean everything to me. Ever since I was a little girl, I dreamed of competing at an Olympics and when I found out they were going to be in London, it just made that drive stronger."

Prentice came into the sport through horse riding and has made rapid improvements in her fencing, running, shooting and swimming over the last couple of years.

The running and shooting are now a combined discipline with laser pistols used instead of pellets and Prentice has welcomed the changes.

"My strongest event is still the riding due to my background and I've always been able to rely on a consistent ride to get me through," she continued.

"Swimming is still my weak point and I've not improved as much as I had hoped.

"I haven't thought too much about being world junior number one. I see myself as competing in the senior ranks rather than in the juniors and going for the Olympics along with Mhairi Spence, Heather Fell and Katy Livingston.

"Whoever makes it will be the best two and they will be chosen purely on performance. It is a very strong group and making the team will be the difficult part.

"Whoever gets selected will definitely be in with a shot of getting on the podium and it will just be such a race for the two British girls to get there."

As if juggling all the events was not enough, Prentice is also studying for a degree in biology at Bath University.

"The university have been very supportive," she acknowledges, "They even changed the date of an exam for me because I was over in China competing and they've allowed me to split my second year over two years and do six modules this year and four next year.

"It's nice to have a distraction from sport but I couldn't do both full-time as there would be too much of a workload. At the same time, I'm glad my studies are over for a while and I can now concentrate full time on sport.

"It's a big summer as we have the European Championships in Medway [Kent] and then the World Championships in Moscow."

RM

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