Yeats-Brown not fazed by top ranking in Turkey

By Ben Baker, Sportsbeat

AS EUROPEAN champion, Katie-Jemima Yeats-Brown heads to the European Youth Olympic Festival with a target on her back, but the promising judoka insists she wouldn't have it any other way.

GOLD RUSH: Yeats-Brown is savouring being the girl to beat in Trabzon as she seeks to add to the European title she captured in June.

The 16-year-old heads to Turkey full of confidence after winning -63kg gold at last month's European Cadet Championships in Malta, Britain's first at the event since 2005.

Yeats-Brown swept all that was put in front of her on her way to picking up the crown, winning four fights without having a single point scored against her.

This means Yeats-Brown will land in Trabzon ranked number one, and although her rivals will be eager to knock her off her pedestal, she isn't about to be running scared.

"I will be ranked number one out in Turkey so hopefully that means I can get a good draw but anything can happen so I am not resting on my laurels," she said.

"It also means that everyone will be gunning for me but I actually like it because it means there is more pressure and it means you are the one to beat.

"And I will be doing all I can to stay number one out in Turkey and I won't be letting go of it just yet that is for sure, at least not without a fight.

"So my goal is to win again and just stay at the top and bring home the title for Great Britain.

"I know the pressure that representing Great Britain brings so that shouldn't get to me out there and I actually love doing it so that should really help."

Yeats-Brown's Malta success vindicated her decision to move up from the -57kg category earlier this year, taking to her new division like a duck to water.

And although on a rapid rise to the top, the she isn't about to run before she can walk, doing her best to ignore the London 2012 clamour.

"All these tournaments are just a start for me and hopefully I can repeat this success in the senior ranks too," she added.

"Getting selected and having success at these tournaments does get you thinking about the future and although the Olympics in 2012 is coming up it isn't my main aim.

"My ultimate goal is Rio in 2016 so these experiences will set my up nicely for the future as I aim to go for Olympic gold in later life."