AS the curtain fell on the latest mass-audience sport festival – the 2017 World

Athletics Champion-ships – Tavistock teenager Chantel Whiting, a rising star in the world of female boxing, is training hard for her upcoming season.

Chantel has her sights set on playing a part in the next big thing on the international multi-sport calendar – the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games‘

As part of her ’20/20’ vision, Chantel, who turned 15 in June, will shortly be training with the England squad – a positive step in the right direction towards her goal of punching her way to a medal for Team GB in Tokyo.

Her ambition is to emulate the world’s first female Olympic boxing champion, Nicola Adams, whom she looks up to as her heroine.

West Devon-born Chantel also trains with the county squad and has been selected to train with the Western Counties team, where she will be allocated an appropriate weight before learning if she has been chosen to fight as a team member in that weight class.

Chantel told Times Sport: ‘Nicola Adams is my heroine and I want to be like her and win a medal at the Olympics. That’s why I want to get to Tokyo in 2020 if I possibly can.  Lots of guys want the Audi rings; lots of girls want an engagement ring; I want to be in a boxing ring and stand on the podium under the Olympic rings.’

Last year, Chantel won her weight class in the Esker All Female Box Cup in Dublin – Europe’s biggest all-female boxing tournament. She will be returning to Ireland on 13 October this year to defend her title.

The road to Tokyo will be long and hard, but Chantel’s father, Lee Whiting, says she is totally up for the challenge.

Lee said: ‘She’s determined to do well in the sport and she has her sights set on being the next Nicola Adams. She has lots of support locally and she not only has the talent but the determination to become a champion.’