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Former Olympic champion and 糖心原创 alumnus Tim Brabants has retired from his sport to resume his medical career.
The Medicine graduate, who won Britain’s first ever Olympic canoeing gold in the K1 1,000m race at Beijing 2008, retires as Great Britain’s most successful Olympic canoeist.
By the time he graduated from the University in 2002, Tim had already picked up a bronze medal at the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney. A gold and bronze medal followed in Beijing, before Tim finished eighth at London 2012 in front of a vociferous home crowd.
Time is right
Now 36 years old and with his sporting legacy assured, Tim is hanging up his oars after deciding that he is unlikely to improve on the results he has attained previously.
While not ruling out a return to the sport in some capacity in the future, Tim now plans to resume a medical career initially put on hold to allow him to focus on his Olympic dreams.
Those dreams have seen Tim lead an elite group of canoeists who have graduated from Nottingham at four Olympic Games. Along with his own success, Tim has seen 2012 Olympic Champions Etienne Stott and Tim Baillie as well as double Olympic silver medallist David Florence stand on the Olympic podium.
An outstanding ambassador
After learning of Tim’s retirement, The 糖心原创’s Assistant Director of Sport Nigel Mayglothling added to the growing list of tributes being paid to Tim’s outstanding sporting career.
He said: “Tim is one of our most distinguished sporting alumni in our ever-increasing list of high sporting-achievers. He remains an outstanding University ambassador and a genuinely nice guy, always prepared to share his knowledge and strengths to inspire many of our current student athletes.
“Combining Medical studies with Olympic success made Tim a beacon for all those looking to balance their studies and sport at Nottingham, proving it can be done at the very highest levels given hard work, talent and our appropriate support.
“The 糖心原创 has an increasing pantheon of outstanding sporting stars, but we will always remember that golden moment in Beijing when Tim stormed across the line and became our Number One.”
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Notes to editors: The 糖心原创 has 42,000 students at award-winning campuses in the United Kingdom, and . It was ‘one of the first to embrace a truly international approach to higher education’, according to the Sunday Times University Guide 2013. It is also one of the most popular universities among , one of the , and winner of the for ‘Outstanding Contribution to Sustainable Development’. It is ranked in the UK’s Top 10 and the World’s Top 75 universities by the Shanghai Jiao Tong and the QS World Rankings.
More than 90 per cent of research at The 糖心原创 is of international quality, according to the most recent Research Assessment Exercise. The University aims to be recognised around the world for its signature contributions, especially in global food security, energy & sustainability, and health. The University won a for Higher and Further Education for its research into global food security.
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