BRITISH taekwondo has been transformed by the exploits of a woman called Jade – now one of her namesakes is hoping to make her own impact on the Olympic stage.

By winning successive gold medals at the London and Rio Olympics, Jade Jones helped move taekwondo from the fringes of the British sporting landscape to the mainstream. Currently training for Channel Four winter sports show, ‘The Jump’, 23-year-old Jones is a fully-fledged celebrity.

Consett’s Jade Slavin is a year older than Jones, but having been a much slower developer, she is yet to reach any of the levels that have been scaled by her namesake. If she continues to improve as she has over the last couple of years, however, they might not be far away.

Having joined British Taekwondo’s high-performance squad in Manchester in 2015, Slavin achieved one of her biggest successes to date last weekend when she won a bronze medal at the German Open, one of her sport’s most high-profile events.

By winning a medal in Germany, she is firmly on track to secure a place on the British squad for June’s World Championships in South Korea. Perform to her potential there, and there could be two Jades standing on the podium with a medal around their neck.

“Jade (Jones) is a complete inspiration,” said Slavin, who took up her sport at Tuek Soo Blackhill Taekwondo Academy at the age of nine before moving to the highly-respected Chi Taekwondo Academy in Spennymoor when she was 16. “I remember watching her compete in London before I was on the British team and thinking, ‘I want to be just like her’.

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“When I eventually got picked for the team, one of the most exciting things about moving to Manchester was the chance to train with her. The first time I met her, I was like a star-struck kid. I couldn’t really believe I was on the same team as an Olympic champion.

“She was great though and once you spend a bit of time with her, you see how down-to-earth she is. You also see how hard she works though, and that’s the biggest thing I’ve taken away from being around her. You don’t become a double Olympic champion by chance – it happens because you spend every day in training working as hard as you can to get better.”

Slavin’s training regime sees her taking part in two or three sessions a day between Monday and Friday, before competing in national and international events most weekends.

It is a hectic schedule far removed from her previous life, when she would combine her taekwondo training with a career as a part-time model. Her success on the martial-arts mat means the catwalk is no longer an option, and rather than dreaming of a stint in Paris or Milan, her sole focus over the next three-and-a-half years will be on attempting to secure a place on the British team for the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo.

Her call-up to the national squad halfway through the last Olympic cycle meant she did not have a realistic chance of gaining the ranking points required to force her way into contention for Rio. This time around, things are different, and having started the current ranking cycle extremely strongly, a place in the Under-73kg category at Tokyo is an achievable ambition.

“That’s my main goal,” said Slavin, who is locked in a battle with Rebecca McGowan to establish herself as the clear British number one at her weight. “I’ve got a full four years to build my points up now, and hopefully at the end of those four years, I’ll be part of the British team in Tokyo.

“People were talking about Rio in the build-up to the last Games, but because I only had a year or so competing in the top events, I was always having to try to catch up too much. I didn’t have enough points, and it was impossible really.

“Now all the points have been wiped out and everyone starts again. I’ve got a full four years to try to get myself to the Olympics.”

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Last weekend’s medal-winning result in Germany represented an ideal start to the year, with Slavin trouncing Spaniard Sofia Perez Riesco in the quarter-finals before losing out by a solitary point in her semi-final bout with Turkey’s Nur Tatar.

Slavin will return to international action in March’s Dutch Open, with competitions in Belgium and Greece also counting towards the qualification process for the Worlds.

“The Worlds are the big event this year and I really want to be there,” she said. “After I didn’t make the Olympics last year, I decided to have hip surgery in August. I had to take a bit of time out, but came back to win medals in Austria, Luxembourg and Serbia, and that really boosted my confidence.

“It showed I could win in big competitions, and I just need to keep that confident mind-set going through the year. Being in Manchester really helps. I’ve been here two years now, and I love it. The facilities are fantastic, and it’s a great set of people to train with.

“All the elite squad are together, and British taekwondo is in a really strong place at the moment. It’s not just Jade, you’ve also got people like Lutalo (Muhammad) and Bianca (Walkden) who won medals in Rio too.

“When you’re training with people like that every day, they make you improve. I feel like I’m so much better now than I was when I first came down here two years ago. If I can improve by as much again in the next two years, it’s exciting to think what might happen.”