JUST months after fearing her chances of representing England were over, a rower from Hexham won two international gold medals.

Lucy Ryan brought her successful spell representing Queen Elizabeth High School to a remarkable close, earning two first places at the Home Countries International Regatta while in the England vest.

She thought her hopes of national representation were over earlier this year when her pairs partner Darcy Jennings, of Emmanuel School in London, changed to sculling instead of rowing which meant Lucy needed to change to a single scull for the GB selection event.

Things didn’t seem to be going her way when she had to pull out of the 2000m race at the 500m mark with chest pains!

However, she grasped a surprise invite to a race-off to secure one of the last two places in the GB junior women’s sweep squad which earned her a place in both the JW coxed four and JW eight at this weekend’s Home Countries event.

Heading into the regatta in Cardiff Bay stroking the England coxed four, Lucy and her crew pulled away from challengers Wales and Scotland to take the gold.

Lucy wasn’t finished there though, and the triumphant coxed four joined forces with country’s coxless four, who also won gold, to make the eight, and their success continued when they took first place ahead of Ireland.

Last year, it was Lucy’s schoolmates Amy Bowman and Milly Dickinson coming back from the event with gold for England.

However, both had taken a step back from the extreme training regime to concentrate on their A-levels.

Yet they showed that strong competitive side which has resulted in many national gold medals once their exams were over, just missing out on a silver in the JW pair in the previous week’s GB Junior Championships.

Their performance impressed selectors to invite them to the Home Countries despite the England team being full, taking the place of a Gloucester Hartpury pair who were already selected for another event.

This meant they had next to no time to train for the event, with the training outing on the day before throwing them off their stride with Milly complaining of sea sickness.

They hoped for calmer waters on race day, but this never materialised. After a trademark strong start, they were knocked back from first to third by several big waves and even their usual blistering finish could not see them overhaul eventual winners Scotland and runners-up Ireland.

While the pair were disappointed to have been beaten by the conditions, they were equally delighted to watch teammate Lucy power her way to two golds.

Former QEHS rower Matthew Mole also impressed at the event as, representing Scotland through residency rules due to his studies at Glasgow University, he took the gold medal in the senior men’s quadruple sculls and silver in the double sculls.