Sharlene Mawdsley could be forgiven for being somewhat wary as two Irish teams go in search of Olympic qualification at the World Athletics Relays Bahamas next week.
Among the 893 athletes from 45 countries that will descend on Nassau for the global event on 4-5 May will be an Irish contingent competing in the women's 4x400m and mixed 4x400m.
Team Ireland have selected a team of 11 athletes hoping to make their mark, with the group currently based in Florida before Texas-based Rhasidat Adeleke links in ahead of the championships.
There are 27 entries for the women's event and 30 for the mixed, so Ireland will have to perform well to take the 14 automatic entries on offer in both events.
For the in-form Mawdsley, part of the Irish women’s 4x400m side that claimed fifth at the recent World Indoor Championships, history has taught her to take nothing for granted.
The Tipperary native was part of the mixed 4x400m team that secured qualification in the last Olympic cycle before being cruelly cut before the Tokyo Games.
Mawdsley has outlined the devastation of that decision at the time, but insists it hasn’t put her off the concept.
The "good shape" is an understatement. She posted two of the top three splits across the semi-final and final of the relay event in Glasgow and while the individual event ended in disappointment in disqualification, she is piecing together the puzzle to take her performances to new heights.
Gym work and improving her starts have been the focus of attention, yet Mawdsley admits that she has always run freer with the baton in her hand.
"I sometimes lack that concentration (in individual)," she says.
Replicating her relay splits in the individual event is a work in progress, but given she, along with Adeleke, Phil Healy, Sophie Becker, Róisín Harrison, Lauren Cadden and Rachel McCann, are down to compete for both teams, her relay form is a huge boon.
Adeleke, who sat out the indoor championships in Glasgow, will be the star attraction in the women’s team, while in the mixed, Thomas Barr comes into the event having posted a time of 46.88 in February.
Cillin Greene, Jack Raftery and Christopher O’Donnell are the others vying for a spot on the team.
In an ideal world, both teams would secure their qualification on day one and avoid the respective nerve-jangling repechages. That scenario would allow the women’s side utilise all their squad, though the mixed event differs in it allows just one substitution.
Mawdsley has been a key figure in Ireland’s progress on the global relay stage.
Fifth at this year’s World Indoors follows on from sixth (mixed) and eighth (women’s) at the World Athletics Championships in Budapest last year. Reaching an Olympic final in Tokyo put the mixed team in elite company, and now the challenge is to raise the bar further.
'You get a little bit of success, and you realise you start to want more and more'
"We’re at a stage where we’re just looking to see what we can do," she says. "It’s not a case of, ‘guys, hopefully we can get into a final’, we’re going in being like, we need to get into this final challenging for medals, not just sitting at the back of the field.
"Having Rhasidat for that is a great bonus and it will be great to see what we can do now that we have her here as well."
Adeleke’s presence will heighten expectations further for both teams, but a rising tide lifts all boats and Mawdsley acknowledges that while her trajectory is going the right way, the same can be said of her team-mates.
"I’m very aware that everyone has stepped up. It’s hard, you get a little bit of success, and you realise you start to want more and more.
"I want to run in the 50s this year, that’s what I’m capable of. If I said that a few years ago, I’d have said 'no, that’s not possible.' Now I’ve been in the training and the work and it’s just a matter of showing on the track."
Her improved endurance should stand to her over what could be two demanding days in the Bahamas.
Looking towards Paris, the 25-year-old is keeping her options open on competing in the relays, though events at the Thomas Robinson Stadium next week will shed more light on that.
After the championships, it’s a busy diary pre-Paris with Mawdsley down for three races ahead of the European Championships in Rome that take place in early June.
It was at the Worlds last year where Mawdsley really made her mark - she was part of the mixed and women’s 4x400m relay teams that reached finals and was a semi-finalist in the individual event - and crucially, convinced her she truly belongs among the best in the business.
"Budapest was the starting point for me in my belief that I actually deserve to be in the races that I’m in, running the times I’m running," she says.
"I go on to the track now believing I deserve to be there, whereas that wasn’t the case before."
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