KAT DRISCOLL admits she does not really know what to expect from the inaugural European Games, but the North-East trampolinist is determined to use the new multi-sport event to gain invaluable experience ahead of next year’s Olympics in Rio.

The European Games, which begin with an opening ceremony in the Azerbaijani host city of Baku on Friday, have been introduced to enable European nations to compete in a multi-sport showcase of their own to stand alongside the Pan-American and Asian Games which have proved so popular in other parts of the world.

The event’s creation has not been without controversy, with some of the leading Olympic sports fearing that it could overshadow their own World or European Championships, but this month’s Games will still see more than 6,000 athletes competing in 20 different sports that include the likes of athletics, boxing, cycling, gymnastics and swimming.

Team GB is sending a team of 160, featuring Olympic champions Jade Jones and Nicola Adams as well as leading North-Easterners Savannah Marshall and Paul Drinkhall.

Driscoll, who boasts a world title in both the team and synchro disciplines of trampolining, will be competing in the individual and synchro events in Baku, and while her main focus for the remainder of the year is November’s World Championships, which offer an opportunity to secure a British place at Rio, the 29-year-old is keen to fully immerse herself in the Games experience.

“I’m really looking forward to it,” said Driscoll, who is based in West Rainton and part of the Apollo club in Washington. “Trampolining isn’t in the Commonwealth Games, so apart from the Olympics, we don’t usually get the chance to experience something like this.

“The competition itself is going to be interesting, and hopefully myself and Laura (Gallagher) will do well. The Russians and Belarussians will be strong, but most of the world’s leading trampolining nations aren’t European so it won’t be at the same standard as the Worlds or anything like that.

“It’ll be good to do synchro again because we haven’t been doing that for the last year or so because British Gymnastics want us to focus on the individual stuff ahead of Rio.

“Most of all though, it’ll just be good to be living in the Games village with thousands of other athletes and getting used to the whole Games experience again. I had that in London, but a lot of the gymnastics team haven’t been to an Olympics so something like this is great for them because it should mean that Rio isn’t a complete surprise if they qualify to compete at the next Olympics.”

Driscoll will begin her competition with the individual prelims on Tuesday, before competing in the synchro finals on June 19 and the final of the individual competition two days later.

She warmed up for the Games with an appearance at the first World Cup of the season in St Petersburg, but things did not go to plan as she failed to complete her preliminary routine. Nevertheless, she expects a much-improved series of performances in Baku.

“It was the first time in I don’t know how many years that I haven’t completed a prelims, but it was just one of those things,” she said. “The routine started badly and then went downhill from there.

“Obviously, you never want that to happen, but it’s better that it happened there than at a more important event later in the year and pretty much everyone in the field was suffering from the same kind of rustiness. Even Rosannagh MacLennan, the Olympic champion, was all over the place.

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“Hopefully, it will help me refocus for what is going to be an important few months. I like to think I’m always pretty committed when I’m training, but something like that makes you concentrate and work even harder than you were before.”

Prior to the London Olympics, Driscoll had to shuffle her training in the main hall of Washington Leisure Centre around the schedule for five-a-side football matches and community badminton sessions.

However, the Centre has just undergone an £11m rebuild, and the new complex, which was officially reopened a fortnight ago, has enabled Apollo to move into an improved training environment.

“It’s good that we’ve got our own little area now,” said Driscoll. “There are trampolines set up full-time now and that makes it a lot easier for all of us to train when we need to.

“In the past, there was no heating so when you were training in the winter it was a nightmare. You got your gear on and had to stop shivering before you could jump.

“That’s all changed now and it’s a massive improvement. It’s all pretty intimate, but I think that’ll help us as a club because one of our biggest strengths has always been that you’ve got international competitors training alongside eight or nine-year-olds just starting out in the sport.”