Dara Alizadeh says he is in the best possible position as he aims to qualify for a second successive Olympic Games at the Americas rowing qualifier in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, .

The 30-year-old Bermudian will be among a strong field of 19 in the single sculls discipline this week and a top-five finish will be enough to secure one of the automatic qualifying spots for the region in Paris this summer.

Alizadeh sealed his place at the the Tokyo Olympics after qualfying at the same stage and venue in 2021 and went on to finish a highly respectable eighteenth in Japan.

“I’m feeling good, feeling strong and I feel like I’m in as good a position as I could be heading into the event,” said Alizadeh.

“Funnily enough I’m in a better position than I was in last time when we were in the mists of the Covid pandemic.

“This is not necessarily my last opportunity to qualify because there is a final event in Switzerland [May 19-21], but ideally you want to qualify as early as possible and so that is my aim.

“I qualified here before, although that doesn’t really count for anything coming into this event. However, that previous experience does help because things won’t be completely new to me and so there won’t be that issue with having to take things in so quickly.

“I feel ready and I’m excited. It would just be awesome to qualify for the Olympics for a second time. It would be everything that I’ve trained for and everything has been geared towards getting to the Games again.

“Being able to represent Bermuda again on the Olympic stage would be a dream come true. I know I’ve been before, but to go again would just mean the world to me and that’s what my full focus is on.”

Competition for places will be fierce with in Brazil an imposing start list that includes home favourite Lucas Verthein Ferreira, who struck gold at last year’s Pan American Games in Santiago, Chile, as well as finishing in fourteenth at the World Rowing Championships.

Another notable entrant is Bruno Cetraro Berriolo, who finished sixth in the lightweight men’s double sculls in Tokyo, and has since made the switch to single sculls as he looks to return to the sport’s biggest stage.

Despite the strength of the field, Alizadeh is far from fazed by the level of competition.

“The strength of the field is not really a shock as it’s for a place at the Olympics and so seeing some big names involved is always expected,” he said.

“Competition always seems to be increasing. A lot of the guys out here have been around the Olympic and World circuits and I remember racing against some of them at the last Games.

“The calibre is going to be really high, but as I said, that’s expected and it’s exciting.”

In an attempt to leave no stone unturned in his preparations for the event, Alizadeh has spent the past month based in the city and he feels that could prove pivotal in giving him an advantage over his rivals.

“I’ve just been spending my time over here getting acclimatised and more importantly spending time on the water at the venue,” said Alizadeh, who spent the winter period competing in Australia.

“I definitely feel like the advantages of the time I’ve spent in Australia and here already could prove important. Everything has gone really well and it’s been really productive.

“I learnt a lot of lessons from the last event here when because of Covid there were a lot of restrictions when we could arrive and then the planned camp beforehand was cancelled late.

“It meant we had so little time to get ready for competition and it really wasn’t the ideal preparation. That’s why this time around I wanted to get here early and it be a case of almost overdoing it in terms of my preparation.

“This way it removes a lot of the stress in terms of logistics and just being be able to take time to get used to the conditions on the lagoon at the venue.

“I feel like it has given me the best possible chance of qualifying because I’ve already done the long rows and hard workouts just to get comfortable with everything out here. It gives me head start on some of the other competitors.

“I’m in a better position than I was when I qualified here previously and so I’m ready to race.”