THE 2024 Paris Olympics are finally upon us with the Opening Ceremony set to take place at 18:30 BST on Friday 26.

For the first time ever, the ceremony won’t be taking place in a stadium and instead, it will be on the infamous River Seine. Some events commence in the days prior to Friday’s celebrations though, including the men and women’s football.

Jo Pavey and Tom Daley are perhaps two of the most famous Olympian to hail from Devon, but who will be representing the county on the biggest stage of them all this summer?

British Swimming Championship gold medallist Ben Proud is London-born but attended Plymouth College as a teen and so has his own Devon links.

Tom Daley of course hails from Plymouth as well, the same going for rowing duo Jacob Dawson and Chloe Brew.

Jacob is a part of the men’s eight team and that event gets underway on Monday 29, whilst Chloe is one-half of the women’s pairs and will begin her Olympic campaign on the same day.

Kerenza Bryson was born in Plymouth and has ties to Ivybridge also and she has enjoyed great success in the build-up to the trip to France. She won gold for Pentathlon GB at the European Senior Championships in the Hungarian capital, Budapest and she will be alongside Kate French in the women’s Modern Pentathlon.

Rowing isn’t the only sport to boast a Devonian duo with hockey having Giselle Ansley (Kingsbridge) and Ollie Payne (Totnes).

Giselle was born in Kingsbridge and attended Churston Ferrers Grammar School and her success is there for all to see. She has won gold in the European Championships and the Commonwealth Games as well as a gold in Rio 2016 and a bronze in Tokyo 2020.

Totnes’ Ollie Payne is newer on the scene on the men’s side of things and was part of the Commonwealth team that earned bronze at Birmingham 2022.

GB’s openers are both against Spain, with the men beginning at 9am on the 27th and the women at 12:15 on the 28th.

Abigail Martin is just 16 and the Paignton gymnast won silver in Rimini, Italy at the European Championships. She is one of a number of teenagers set to represent Team GB and the artistic gymnastics begin on Saturday 27.

Ruby Stacey of Tavistock is also just a teen and she is a reserve for the gymnastics squad.

Lastly, there is Ben Lane (Exmouth) and Sam Sills (Launceston). Ben is partnering Sean Vendy in the badminton men’s doubles, alongside whom he won European silver last year, and Sam, who went to school in Tavistock, will compete in the men’s windsurfing (iQFOiL).

Good luck to all local athletes and the whole of Team GB!