HIS first experience of the Olympics might have been something of a disaster, but North Yorkshire diver Jack Laugher claims the lessons learned from London 2012 have transformed him into a strong medal contender ahead of this summer’s Rio Games.

Laugher, who is from Ripon, will start as one of the favourites in the Olympic 3m springboard competition after his place on Team GB’s 11-strong diving squad was confirmed last week.

The 21-year-old will be desperate to improve on his 2012 performance, when a combination of nerves and inexperience resulted in him crashing out at the preliminary stage in London’s Aquatics Centre.

Having completely mistimed one of his dives, effectively ‘belly-flopping’ into the water, Laugher exited the competition in tears, but the experience made him a much stronger character and proved a turning point in his career.

The last four years have seen him emerge as one of his sport’s most consistent performers, and his overall victory in last year’s World Series, along with the two individual medals he has won at the World Championships, mark him down as a potential gold medallist in Rio.

“I was 17 years old in London, and I’d had very little competitive experience,” said Laugher, who does most of his training in Leeds. “I was riddled with ankle and elbow injuries, and mentally I was a kid taking it all in and getting overwhelmed by it all.

“Technically, now I’m ten times better as a diver, and although my experiences in London were negative, they have taught me how to cope. If I’d sat here for four years thinking about how bad it all was, I wouldn’t have been able to improve.”

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Laugher proved his mental strength when he won his second World Junior title a matter of months after his Olympic embarrassment, and he has soared up the world rankings in the last two years in both the individual and synchro springboard events.

His synchro partnership with Chris Mears brought a gold medal at the 2014 Commonwealth Games, and the pair also triumphed at last month’s European Diving Championships, which were held in London.

Their European victory saw them showcase their new signature effort, a high-tariff dive that could prove crucial to their chances of victory in Rio.

“We used it for the first time in competition in Rio earlier this year (at the Olympic test event),” said Laugher. “It’s a forward two-and-a-half somersault with three twists, which no one else in the world really does in synchro.

“It’s been pretty consistently good throughout the year, and then at the European Championships we both nailed it, and I thought it was under-marked personally.

“It should have gone over 100 points. The judges in their judging meeting said they had never really seen it before. They didn’t really know how to go with it.

“It was fantastic. If we can do that in Rio, then I’m pretty sure we’re going to get a massive amount of points.”

Like the diving events at the Barcelona Olympics in 1992, this summer’s competition in Rio will take place in an outdoor pool, a scenario that presents its own set of challenges.

“I don’t mind it being an outdoor pool,” said Laugher. “It’s going to be their winter – I’m sure the competition will still go on if it’s spitting and raining.

“There are differences from diving inside and diving outside. When you’re spinning around and then kick out, you generally spot for something and can roughly gauge where you are in the air. But when it’s all blue sky, it’s very hard to judge perfectly where you are.

“Outside, you have a different perspective with the sky, so it’s important to train outdoors and get used to everything.”

Laugher’s performances over the last 12 months mean he has even begun to eclipse Tom Daley, who has long been regarded as the poster-boy of British diving.

“It’s always nice to be slightly in the shadows so that not all the attention is cast on you, and I don’t particularly thrive on it, but it’s nice to get the recognition which is a mark of how much you’ve improved,” he said.

“I never doubted myself, even during the setbacks, and my track record shows I can definitely win a medal in Rio.

“It’s all about focusing on what I need to do to improve, and making sure I’m totally prepared, as opposed to London where I wasn’t really in a good place to compete.”