North Yorkshire's Georgie Brayshaw on 'incredible' experience as her team take Team GB's sixth medal at Paris Olympics

Rower Brayshaw, whose parents live in Whitby, was part of the women’s quadruple sculls crew that edged out the Netherlands at the very last moment of this morning’s (July 31) final.

Trailing their European rivals throughout and still half-a-length behind with only 200 metres to go, Team GB produced a storming finish, nosing in front with the final stroke of the race just as the boats crossed the finish line.

That historic victory was secured in a time of 6 minutes 16.31 seconds, just 0.015 seconds ahead of the Dutch (6:16:46).

In doing so alongside Hannah Scott, Lola Anderson and Lauren Henry, 30-year-old Brayshaw became part of the first British team ever to win Olympic gold in the women’s quadruple sculls squad.

“It’s just incredible, I have no words,” Brayshaw said.

“It just means so much. I don’t really think too much about what happened and just got on with it.

“I just had belief in what they were telling me from behind me, if they tell me we can get this I just trust them so much.

“It’s really amazing.”

Already a world and European quadruple sculls champion, Brayshaw’s achievements as a rower are made all the more incredible by the adversity she has had to overcome to make it to the very top of the sport.

Aged 15, she fell from a horse, was in a coma for nine days and left temporarily paralysed down the left side of her body.

Doctors initially warned her parents – who now live in Whitby – that Brayshaw would never walk again, or be able to feed herself, but she was back on her feet again within weeks.

Having left North Yorkshire to attend university in Northampton, she then took up rowing and went on to excel, earning her first call up to Team GB as recently as 2022.

Dad Robert had appealed to the people of Whitby to cheer on his daughter, when the Olympics got under way last Friday.