Road to Rio 2016: Hard work is paying off for Olympics-bound Chris Mears

After suffering a ruptured spleen, the 15-year-old was given a five per cent chance of survival. Incredibly, three years later, the diver was celebrating fifth and ninth-placed finishes at the London 2012 Games.

A man capable of defying the odds, the statistics are now in Mears’s favour with the diver at the ‘peak of his powers’ ahead of the Rio 2016 Olympics.

Mears relocated from the Southampton Diving Academy to the City Of Leeds Diving Club shortly after the London Games and has already secured his ticket to South America having qualified for his 3m synchro spot alongside Jack Laugher at Kazan last summer.

The 23-year-old also hopes to be selected alongside Laugher in the individual event, yet the reality is that any sort of diving achievement is quite remarkable given the events of 2009.

It was upon training in Sydney at the Youth Olympic Festival that Mears ruptured his spleen – losing five pints of blood – with doctors believing the Reading-born athlete had little chance of survival, let alone diving again.

A seven-hour seizure then led to Mears being in a coma for three days. It is understandable that Mears chooses to live life in the short term but, seven years after his terrible ordeal, that life is going very nicely indeed.

“I should have lost my life really in 2009,” said Mears. “But someone was looking out for me and I fought through it. I have been on a big journey and when I actually got to the Olympic Games, it was kind of like a reward.

“I kind of look back on it and think: ‘Yes, hard work does pay off, and good things do happen.’ Good things are at the end of the tunnel.

“It’s a great feeling to know that I am going back for my second Olympics and I would love to get another individual dive because I did really well at London and want to replicate that.

“I have struggled with injuries over the last couple of years and I just haven’t quite really shone individually, not like in the synchro which has been really strong. But I am in really good shape now. I am at the peak of my powers.”

Those powers were again highlighted when Mears and Laugher scooped silver at this month’s World Diving Series leg in Kazan.

May’s European Championships in London are next and Mears will be well aware of the significance of Friday, June 17 – the day his country’s Rio Olympics diving team will be announced. It is then when Mears will discover if he has one chance or two to prove a hit in Rio. Long-term, a smash hit is another dream for the 23-year-old, who is also an internationally acclaimed DJ and producer in his spare time – although a gold medal would outweigh any platinum disc.

“There’s not a very high percentage of people that have been to an Olympic Games,” said Mears.

“To get an Olympic medal is something that is just life changing.

“There is so much hard work and determination that goes into it that some people don’t realise – all those hard days where you can’t be bothered to get out of bed and all that. That’s what it’s all about. Getting a No 1 hit – you might just get lucky one day.”