THE intensity has picked up for Warrington’s Beijing-bound heavyweight rower Richard Egington in the second week of a training camp in Austria.

He has been selected for Team GB’s men’s eight at the Olympic Games next month and the 18 days of training on a lake high up in the Silvretta mountain range should stand him and his colleagues in good stead for the challenges ahead.

The 29-year-old former Lymm High School student said: “It’s one of the longest training camps and our coach says that he is trying to compact the season into this training camp.

“The first week started with high mileage and low intensity on the water, as well as a few sessions on the rowing machine and weights.

“The second week the mileage is still high and the intensity has gone up but there’s been less weights.

“Our third and final week will be all about raw speed work, with the mileage coming down and the intensity going right up.

“On the last day we will do a 2,000-metre row on the course, like a race piece, and that can be quite unpleasant when 2,100 metres up in the Alps.

“Because we’re so high up and the air is much thinner, it’s really hard to get the oxygen in when you’re working flat out.”

Warrington’s Olivia Whitlam, also selected for Beijing in the women’s pair event, has been stepping up her preparations in Germany.

Egington and Whitlam are the first rowers from Warrington to gain Olympic selection.