WANBOROUGH wheelchair tennis ace Louise Hunt returns to action after a three-month break at this week’s North West Challenge in Preston, which gets under way today.

The 25-year-old, who competed at her second Paralympic Games in Rio last summer, has not contested a competitive match since the Bath Indoor Tournament back in mid-November.

With the next Paralympics still more than three years away, Hunt has put a focus on training in 2017 in order to see a marked improvement in her performance in time for Tokyo 2020.

Hunt, a former top-10 player in both singles and doubles, will also compete in next week’s Bolton Arena tournament and hopes ring rust will not be too much of an issue over the next fortnight.

“I am playing Preston and then Bolton, and then I am having a break from tournaments until the end of April but I will be in a solid training block until then,” said Hunt, who is currently ranked 13th in the world in singles and one place higher in doubles.

“In training, we try as much as we can to get it as close to match practice as possible, which is hard.

“Preston will be a case of blowing out the cobwebs and then hopefully by Bolton, I will be on it.

“I feel really good at the moment. I feel really good on court and really focussed. Weirdly, although I haven’t had a tournament in a couple of months, I feel really ready for them.

“I think having a bit of time away from the tour has given me that buzz back because last year was exhausting.

“There is definitely going to be a case of blowing out the cobwebs to start with but I want to hit them hard and I want to do well, so we will see how it goes.”

Hunt has been joined by fellow TeamGB Paralympians Marc McCarroll and Antony Cotterill in the field in Preston, with the duo both competing in the men’s draw.