My name is Matthew Tarrant. I recently turned 24 and am a member of the Great Britain Rowing team training towards Rio 2016. In 2012, I won Gold at the U23 World Championships and last year I stroked the heavyweight coxless four to a silver medal at World cup II and a 5th place finish at the World Championships. This year I won Bronze at the European Championships, Silver at World Cup II and Bronze at World Cup III.
As a full-time athlete, I constantly try to have my eyes and ears open for anything I can do to give me an edge over my opposition. Since learning of its many health benefits, and so incorporating it into my morning routine, I have become a big fan of green tea. Only lightly caffeinated but rich in vitamins, minerals, polyphenols and flavanoids, I figure that even if many of its health benefits are subject to ongoing study, green tea has definitely aided my physical and mental recovery through the heavy loads I put on my body daily.
teapigs offer a wide and exciting range of green tea infusions. Trying new flavours every day has livened up my morning brew and has certainly been something to look forward to on the painfully early starts. I particularly like the mao feng green tea; liquorice and peppermint; and their super fruit, but picking any top three flavours is no easy feat- tea pigs cut no corners in production and it really makes all the difference in quality of flavour.
There is a lot of recent hype surrounding matcha green tea powder, being a precious, super-concentrated form of green tea. Naturally, I could not wait to try it! teapigs offer a specialised “Matcha Kit”, containing the powder and specialised equipment to make it up according to its correct instruction. This consists of a measuring spoon, an electric handheld frother and a generously-sized shot glass. It is great fun to brew up, although I should advise readers to learn from my poor experience and whisk the powder into minimal boiling water and in a larger container, unless they want their first taste of luxury matcha green tea to be directly off their kitchen counter!!
My dream and ultimate goal is to represent Great Britain at the 2016 Rio Olympics and come home with a Gold medal around my neck. If I'm still in one piece, I see myself carrying on to hopefully compete at successive Olympic games and carry on the winning streak! My journey for this year is now reaching its climax with the World Rowing Championships just around the corner. I will be away for a month of intensive training camps in preparation for taking on the rest of the world and you can bet I’ll always have a handy pot of matcha in my rucksack on my travels.
Please follow my journey and show your support by visiting my website which I try and keep as updated as possible www.matthewtarrant.co.uk and also on twitter: @matthewtarrant. I love receiving messages and I always try and reply!
