South Hams teenager Yanni Barnett, who followed in her mother's footsteps by becoming tae kwon do world champion, now has her sights set on repeating the feat.

The first step on the road to qualifying for the next world championships, which are held every two years, will be the British Championships, which will be held in Crawley, West Sussex, in October this year.

Qualifying points are vital if you are to be considered for the GB team, and as the next world championships taking place in London in 2016, by which time Yanni will be 17, she has to move up an age group from U16s to U18s, despite not turning 16 until next year.

Both mum and daughter know that this will be a gigantic step, but with hard work and dedication anything is possible, and 15-year-old world champion Yanni has already proved she has those qualities in spades.

The British Champ­ionships will be Yanni's first since the World Championships in Rome in July. She travelled to Rome as part of an elite squad representing the UK. Prior to the event, Yanni had to maintain her ranking over a two-year period in order to qualify for the event, her first international competition.

As Mum Sophie, herself a world champion in 2010, said: 'The pressure and intensity is completely different, it's like nothing you've ever done before. She was only just 15, it was her first international competition, and she was selected as captain.

'She was just brilliant, she just dealt with the pressure brilliantly, only certain people can cope with it all.'

Yanni, who was competing in the second grade U16 girls category, only turned 15 in June, the month before the event, but proved she was ready spectacularly by taking gold in the patterns, becoming South Hams Martial Arts' youngest world champion and taking her place on the podium among competitors from Argentina, Aus­tralia and Sweden.

Yanni was also part of the girls' team event, where each member of the team had to take part in team patterns, team sparring as well as breaking event, where three of the team had to break boards with hands or feet.

Yanni, as the head of the team, bravely volunteered to be part of the three that did the breaking, with the team eventually securing a hard-fought bronze medal. The team also won bronze for the patterns event.

In addition, she made it through to the individual finals of the sparring, earning a silver medal.

Yanni, who has weekly training with the Team UK squad in Bristol, is currently training for around 12 hours a week, plus the usual workload of a 15-year-old student working towards her GCSEs.

Sophie was particularly keen to thank Kingsbridge Commu­nity College for the help and flexibility they have provided to Yanni, who has had to spend a lot of time travelling for various competitions around the UK, a situation which is likely to repeat itself this year.

Sophie also wishes to thank people of Kingsbridge after successful bag pack in Tesco.

Speaking about South Hams Martial Arts, the club Yanni and Sophie both belong to, Sophie said: 'We're a dinky club, but we have produced four world champions, one of whom is instructor Lesley McGhie.'