* Article courtesy wais.org.au, edits by WFF

Wally Foreman Foundation scholarship recipient Matt Wearn has become one of the first Australian Olympic Team selections for Tokyo 2020, with the initial sailing berths announced in Sydney this week.

Wearn, 23, is the current world number one in the Laser class will make his Olympic debut, having consistently been ranked among the top sailors in the world over the past seven years.

The Wally Foreman Foundation supported Wearn through a $10,000 scholarship that enabled him to compete internationally over the past 18 months in pursuit of Olympic selection.

Wearn's selection came against the odds, having shone through a consistently tight competition with the current Olympic Champion and 2019 World Champion, fellow Australian Tom Burton. 

A former footballer, Wearn elected to pursue his sailing dream as a 15-year-old and has never looked back, with a list of honours to his name including the 2018 and 2019 Laser European Championship titles and World Championship silver. 

He was also named the 2018 WAIS Athlete of the Year and 2018 Australian Male Sailor of the Year.

His latest success came less than a month ago with silver at the Hempel World Cup Series in Enoshima, Japan, which will host the Olympic sailing competition next year.

"I'm just ecstatic," Wearn said. "After I got the call that I was selected, I just sat down in silence for a minute and let it soak in. The excitement really kicked in and I felt like jumping around the house.

"I'm so excited to represent Australia at an Olympics - to be rubbing shoulders with incredible athletes that Australia will have in Tokyo across so many sports is crazy to think about. It doesn’t feel 100 per cent real yet, still feels like a bit of a dream."

The highly competitive Laser has been won by Australian's at the last two Olympic Games through Burton (2016) and Tom Slingsby (2012) with Wearn now focused on adding his name to Australia's strong sailing history at Olympic Games.

"Australian Sailing teams have had such strong results at the Olympic level, it's a massive honour to have a chance to continue that legacy. With Australia winning the Laser in London and Rio, to continue that success is a major goal.

"We've competed at Enoshima a lot the past few years and I’m really comfortable in the conditions. Luckily the conditions are similar to Sydney – Enoshima gets big swells, really similar to when we train off Sydney heads after a few days of southerlies.

"Sometimes the wind comes off the land in Enoshima which makes conditions shifty and quite hot, which we can recreate whenever there's a hot westerly in Sydney. It gives the team great confidence to be able to train and recreate those conditions at home."

Coached by WAIS Sailing Head Coach, Belinda Stowell herself an Olympic gold medallist in the Women's 470 in 2012, Matt's Olympic selection comes 19 years to the day that Stowell commenced competition on route to her gold medal in 2000.