Nine years after making history by becoming Great Britain's first gold medallist of London 2012 alongside team-mate Heather Stanning, Helen Glover has declared her ambition to give the Olympics one more shot.

Glover has not tired of the history-making feats that saw the pair become Britain's first female rowing champions and go on to dominate their sport, winning world and European titles before parting ways in the wake of their second Olympic triumph in Rio.

While Stanning resolutely announced her retirement two months later, Glover kept her options open, retreating from the sport to marry TV presenter Steve Backshall and start a family, but never quite making the end of her glittering Olympic odyssey official.

It proved a prescient move as Glover, now with three children under the age of three, has submitted to the itch to achieve one more sporting milestone by becoming the first British woman to be selected for the rowing team for the Games after having children.

Glover told the PA news agency: "When the new year rang in 2020 and we expected the Games to be going ahead in six months' time, I was just about to have twins and was looking forward to watching the Olympics from my sofa.

"I was very much prepared to be not involved, and definitely at the realisation that Olympics and rowing wouldn't be a part of my future. It's not something I anticipated or expected – I still tell myself it's not really happening."

And as she homes in on an improbable return to Olympic action, she reflected on the unusual circumstances which made her return from the brink of retirement something that was possible.

"I would obviously never choose to have had this year, but everybody has their way of getting through and sport has always been my way of doing that," said Glover.

"It slowly developed from training during the babies' nap schedules to seeing some scores coming back and getting excited and thinking it could be done.

"I would have thought it was ridiculous then it seemed less ridiculous as the weeks ticked by. There wasn't a lot else going on, so it seemed like a good opportunity just to try."