I started my first year in Renmore National School in Galway, but we moved out to An Spideal in my second year to an all-Irish speaking school, Scoil Chroi Mhuire. We learnt Irish as new. We were very lucky to have an old man down the road from us who taught us Irish because we hadn't a word before going to Spiddal.

It was a very active school - not so much in sport because it didn't have the facilities at the time - but we did a lot of drama, art, debating.

Up until first class I was with my brothers, but it was a girls' school from then on. In hindsight, I don't think it helps kids. I had a great time in the school there, but then you have to learn to socialise with guys afterwards.

Then I went to Colaiste Cholmcille in Inverin. My dad was a teacher there when I started and he became principal when I was in second or third year, but it was never an issue.

Outdoor education was a big thing in the school. Dad actually went and did a course in outdoor education so he could teach it in the school. That was when I was in first year or second year - and he came back one weekend with a boat from this course.

So I was introduced to canoeing at home. A club formed in the school. It had all the equipment so from about third year on we got very active in the outdoors.

I don't know whether it was Dad being a teacher, but there was always: "Education is important too - you have to pass the exams at the end." So you would knuckle down whenever exam time came along - and even though we'd be out there in the boats or whatever, they'd be telling us: "One centimetre of cubed water is one gram weight." They'd always try and integrate the sport with bits of knowledge.

At first I was a worrier. I worked really hard for my Junior Cert. I really wanted to do well in it, and then I became more and more active in these other things - sport and that - and it allowed me be a bit more relaxed about exams. Getting into NUI Galway was definitely a priority, but I wasn't sure about which course. It was going to be either teaching or medicine or physiotherapy. Then I got the points and went and did medicine.

I found the transition really weird. It could be hard at times, because you need so many other skills to get on with so many different kinds of people. It's so diverse. I think the focus on points, points, points doesn't address that at all.

I was very into canoeing at this stage. As soon as I got to college I was doing medicine, but I was also part of the kayak club and that took up a lot of my extra hours. I started competing then as well, so it became a very prominent part of college.

I should have finished last year - it's a six-year course. In fact, I've two more years to do. I did three years initially, and it was in my third year in college that I started training in slalom - that was in 1996. We've no slalom site in Ireland so I took a year off and went off to Nottingham. Then the following year I came back to do fourth year and I used to travel away a lot - Christmas, Easter, any breaks we got, and a lot of weekends, I'd head over to Wales to train. I knew I had to qualify a year later so I took a year off to prepare for the World Championships, and then I took another year off to prepare for the Olympics. The goal was the Olympics.

I go back to college in October. I'm really excited about it - only two years to go - and I suppose I have confidence. I've taken a year out before and it was fine getting back into it. I'll probably have to do a little bit of extra catching up, but I have done a lot of the theory work by now.

I think sport and education complement each other. You have to be pretty strategic, but I think one can give you the confidence to do the other, and I've found they've helped me.

In conversation with Elaine Larkin