SHE might be an Olympic champion, but North-East rower Kat Copeland is happy to be reverting to her former status as an underdog as she prepares to compete in the European Championships later this month.

Copeland, who won the Olympic lightweight double sculls gold alongside Sophie Hosking in 2012, will team up with new partner Charlotte Taylor as she tackles the same event to kick off a summer season that will culminate in the World Championships in France, which offer an opportunity to qualify for next year’s Olympics in Rio.

Since returning to rowing after a year-long post-Olympics hiatus, the Tees Rowing Club star has experienced mixed fortunes on the national and international stage. She claimed a creditable bronze medal rowing with Imogen Taylor at last year’s Europeans, but surprisingly failed to make the final at the World Championships that followed a couple of months later.

Winter testing went well, but after cruising into the final at last month’s British Trials, she was edged into third position in a thrilling photo finish.

As a result, she will head into this summer’s international programme with something of a point to prove, a scenario that bears more than a passing resemblance to the position in which she found herself at the same stage of the last Olympic cycle, a year out from London.

“I don’t know if I should really be saying this, but last year, we didn’t do very well,” said Copeland, who has relocated from her home in Stokesley to base herself close to British Rowing’s high performance centre in Caversham. “We didn’t get into the final at the Worlds, and that was a massive disappointment.

“I’m sure some of the other crews are looking at us and questioning where we’re going to be at come this year’s Worlds, so in a way we’re back to being the underdogs and I think that suits us.

“I liked the fact that we were under the radar in the build-up to the last Olympics, and if that’s going to be the case again this time around, that’s fine.

“People keep asking whether I’ve been able to draw a line under everything that happened in London, and to be honest, it’s pretty easy to do that at the moment because in a way we’re starting from scratch with everything to prove. We’re a new partnership and we have to prove ourselves. That’s just how I like it.”

Be that as it may, though, Copeland and Taylor will have to be at the peak of their powers by the time the World Championships begin at the end of August if they are not to leave themselves facing a nervous nine months.

There will be a final chance to claim a place in Rio at a qualification regatta at the start of next summer, but the majority of places will be allocated at the Worlds and the aim is to claim one of the automatic spots on offer in Aiguebelette.

A strong showing at the Europeans would represent a significant step towards the achievement of that goal, and while the field will be lacking some of the North American and Australasian crews that are likely to be medal contenders come next summer, Copeland is expecting a tough test.

“The racing this summer is going to be vicious,” she said. “It’s such a big year, and in some respects, the battle to qualify for the Olympics is even more intense than the actual Olympics themselves.

“It’s pretty unforgiving in terms of having to peak for a small number of events because they’re the ones that are all-important. We’re not in a sport where you get lots of chances to qualify, you have to take the ones that come along.

“Getting a medal at last year’s Europeans was fantastic, but the most important thing about this year’s championships is to get ourselves back into the swing of racing competitively and see where we are in relation to some of the other crews. Then the rest of the summer will go from there.”

Copeland has not had to deal with too much disappointment during her career, but the 24-year-old admits she initially struggled to come to terms with her failure to win at last month’s Trials.

She could hardly have been more dominant as she won her semi-final, but she was caught in the final 100m of the final and is still attempting to get to the bottom of what went wrong.  

“I still don’t think I have any really solid answers about what happened,” she said. “I have to be honest, I was pretty devastated immediately after the race.

“But if I think about it logically now, it was just one race and I know the rest of my winter training and all the testing had been fine.

“I’m still sitting down and trying to analyse it with my coach (James Harris), but we’re both confident there’s nothing drastic there that needs addressing.

“It just wasn’t to be, but perhaps that’s the best thing that could have happened at this stage of the season because it’s certainly ensured I’m not taking anything for granted. If I’d won by miles, maybe that wouldn’t have quite been the same.”