Staffordshire's Burgess is powered up by world title gold rush

The 22-year-old was crowned champion in the C1 class at the Junior and Under-23 Canoe Slalom World Championships in April.

He was one of three members from Stafford and Stone Canoe Club competing in Foz do Iguacu.

The 22-year-old, from Stone, said: "I was happy to have a solid run and not have anything go wrong. I knew how I was doing in training and if I was solid I'd be okay and be really competitive.

"It's always competitive in these competitions; any medals are hard to come by. To get on top, I'm really proud of it."

Chris Bower, Burgess' club-mate, achieved an impressive sixth-place finish in the Junior Kayak.

"It was really a good result for him as it was his second year on the team," said Burgess, who also won a silver medal in the C1M team event. "It's always quite nice to have medals in the camp. The C1M event was team runs where three of us go down in the same time but not in the same boat, we follow each other. The event only happens at the World and EU Championships."

Burgess – who started canoeing, aged 10, at his school and his since trained at the Stone and Stafford club – will be competing in the Senior European Championships in three weeks time in the singles and doubles.

He'll then take part in the world series over the summer before "the big one" – the IFC Canoe Slalom World Championships in London in September.

"It's really exciting to be competing on home soil and I'm looking for a good performance," he said. "Home advantage is a bit of a big thing in our sport.

"The white water course we are competing on is really difficult and was used in the Olympics."

Burgess and his doubles colleague Gregg Pitt were on the canoeing reserve team at the London 2012 Olympics. The first team bagged gold and silver, and competition for Rio will be "really tight", Burgess said.