EXPERIENCED TT shot-putter Cleopatra Borel, who made an appearance at the National Association of Athletics Administrations Test event on Sunday, is not rushing into a decision about whether to take part at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.

If Borel, 42, competes at the 2021 Olympics from July 23-August 8 it would be her fifth appearance at the games. Borel made her Olympic debut at the 2004 games in Athens.

Borel, the lone participant in the women’s shot put event at the Hasely Crawford Stadium on Sunday, finished with a top throw of 16.12 metres on her fourth attempt.

Borel was heartened that so many girls competed in the shot-put age-group categories.

A multiple Sportswoman of the year Winner, she has won medals at the Central American and Caribbean Games, Commonwealth Games and Pan American Games.

Borel said she is trying to regain her fitness.

“Prior to the pandemic I had surgery and have not had an opportunity to get myself into a position where I was in shape to achieve the Olympic standard, so currently I do not have the Olympic standard,” Borel told Newsday.

Borel, who needs to achieve the standard of 18.50m in the coming months to qualify, added, “However, I am training , I am throwing, but to say that I am going to place that pressure on myself to try and get the standard in our current circumstance (with the pandemic), I would say no. I am not going to do that to myself.”

Borel is moving forward cautiously. “I am back at it, but things are too chaotic for me to put that particular level of stress on myself. I am training and doing my best and we just have to wait and see what happens.”

On Sunday, Borel did not push her body to the maximum as she is slowly getting back to fitness.

“I did not compete with my full technique. I just did a sort of a warm-up to try to get into a competitive space and I threw 16 metres. That was the objective for last Sunday to go over 16 in doing what is called a standing throw in shot put and that’s what I did.”

She was happy to retire last year, but the pandemic made her rethink those plans.

“I am enjoying my sport. I was more than willing to walk away from the sport, I was ready to walk away in 2020 and to be quite frank, to lose everything in a pandemic, meaning my various endeavours, is just more than I can handle.

“I find solace in competing in the shot put. If I am able to make the Olympic standard, that’s fabulous, but at the same time I just enjoy the sport for my own recreation. I am training as hard as I can, but things are very challenging.”

Asked if she is taking it day by day, Borel said, “Absolutely, because there is never any guarantee, but definitely now more than ever there is no guarantee that the Olympics are actually going to be hosted.”

Borel believes it has been a testing time for athletes around the world.

“I think for a lot of athletes it has been a mental challenge to keep going and when your systems are weak prior to the pandemic, a pandemic really highlights and exacerbates our present weaknesses and challenges and so it is very difficult.”