BROMSGROVE starlet Lauren Rowles is hoping to start her bid for the Rio 2018 Paralympics.

The gifted teenager is one of three members of GB Rowing Team’s para-rowing World medal crews selected to race in the Gavirate International in a fortnight’s time.

This traditional season-opener will offer a chance, according to lead coach Tom Dyson, “to open the lungs and race for real for the first time in 2016”.

Tom Aggar and Rachel Morris will contest the arms-only single scull events (ASM1x and ASW1x) while Laurence Whiteley and Rowles will race in both the trunk-arms double (TA2x) and singles.

All three crews won silver at the 2015 World Championships.

“We will see how our winter’s training has gone and get a chance to measure up against some top opposition”, added Dyson of the three-day event which takes place in Italy between April 22 and 24.

Rowles and Whiteley’s World silver came in their debut international regatta as a crew.

Rowles, currently juggling A-level studies and exams alongside her training, was talent-spotted into rowing just last year from wheelchair athletics in which she competed at the 2014 Commonwealth Games.

The teenager, who turns 18 on Sunday, faces a big year as she juggles her studies and aims to qualify for the Rio Paralympics in September.

Mother Natalie Rowles said: "Lauren has so much on at the moment, most people of her age would be going out and partying.

"Instead she's working hard on her A-levels and has spent the winter training hard.

"The biggest thing for her would be to be selected for Rio.

"Britain booked a boat in their category with the success at the World Championships but the crews won't be selected until the summer, so it's important she makes a good start."

The King Edward's student, who hopes to start university in September, has also been nominated in the Spirit of Bromsgrove awards outstanding achievement category.

The winners were set to be announced last night, with her grandparents attending the awards as Lauren flies out to Italy to compete.