Canada's taekwondo hope Skylar Park hopes to shine further in Paris. GETTY IMAGES

Canada's Skylar Park was a rookie Olympian at Tokyo 2020, trying to make sense of the most pressure-packed competition of her life in the middle of a pandemic. Now she is preparing for her second Games as one of the leaders in the Olympic women's 57kg category.

At the end of last year she won the Pan American President's Cup in Rio de Janeiro, the Taiyuan World Taekwondo Grand Prix in China and the Pan American Games in Santiago, Chile. "I've matured so much since Tokyo - I feel like it's been forever," she said. 

"Just to be able to just share that journey with the community and the people around me is exciting. I'm really planning to do more in the community before Paris," she told the Winnipeg Free Press. 

Commenting on her preparations, Park said: "Usually when we're competing back-to-back there's not a lot of time to get a big training block. So I'm really taking the opportunity right now to get that training in. And then my team and I will sort of decide. There's a bunch of competitions before the Games, so we'll decide where I kind of want to get back in the ring, just to sharpen up," Park concluded.

Seeing Skylar on the podium in Paris is a dream scenario for Canada, which hasn't won an Olympic medal since Karine Sergerie won silver in the 57-kilogram division at the 2008 Games. Canada's only other medal came from Dominique Bosshart, who won bronze in the +57kg category in 2000.