FORMER York City Rowing Club ace Tom Ransley is looking forward to rowing a "mountain of miles" as the Great Britain men's eight team prepare for their tilt at Olympic glory this summer.

Ransley was part of the crew that finished second at the final World Cup event in Poland, following a stroke-for-stroke battle with Germany that saw GB finish half-a-second behind the eventual winners, but five-and-a-half clear of third-placed New Zealand.

The performance was a marked improvement on a fourth-placed result at the previous World Cup regatta in Lucerne, as the eight boat look to peak at the right time ahead of August's Rio Games.

Reflecting on preparations for Brazil, Ransley said: "Of course, the end result in Lucerne was not the result we are aspiring for come Rio, but it is important to learn and Poznan was a decent performance to end the World Cup Series.

"It showed the direction we need to go in order to reach our best and there were considerable improvements made over the regatta in terms of our racing rhythm, but it was not the complete picture. There is still more we can do.

"The final was the last race before Rio and the journey to the Olympics is full of ups and downs, but the heavyweight men's team has shown some really impressive results over the last four years. We also have a great atmosphere in the camp and I think that helps to push each other on to keep improving.

"We now enter the final phase of training before the Olympics and I know we can make big steps in this period. There are a mountain of miles to be rowed and I cannot wait to get stuck in."

Ransley will be competing in his second successive Olympics, having won eights bronze at London four years ago and, on the honour or representing his country again in the biggest sporting event on the planet, he added: "I am very proud to be selected to represent GB at my second Olympics.

"There has been a lot of hard work in order to reach this point and I will be pushing on between now and Rio to ensure the best possible result."

Ransley has been named in a 12-man sweep, from which selection for the eight boat will be made.

It is a group that includes double Olympic fours' gold medallists Pete Reed and Andrew T Hodge, as well as London 2012 bronze winners Ransley, Matt Langridge and Will Satch.

Of the quality available to be drawn upon, Ransley added: "One of the assets of being in such a high-calibre team is that, no matter which name you pluck out of the hat, there will be a medal-winning history attached to it. But rowing is a team sport and the beauty, especially with big boats, is that the best boat speed comes from working in unison.

"The phrase 'better than the sum of its parts' is the name of the game. Fortunately, we have a lot of European, world and Olympic Champions as our parts."

Ransley and Langridge are the only members of the eight-man crew that finished third at Dorney Lake during the last Games who have been named in the same squad for South America, but the ex-University of York pupil, who competed with the fours last year, explained that there are no strangers among his team-mates.

"Matt and I were both in the London 2012 eight and I am sure that improving upon the bronze is fundamental in the psychology and motivation that drives us forward," he admitted. "The whole team also has a very interrelated history and everyone has a keen understanding of what makes each other tick."

Ransley also insisted that he has no preference in terms of his position in the boat, having been in seat number seven for Lucerne before moving to number two in Poznan.

"In the last seven years, I have raced in every seat possible in the GB eight, bar the coxswain's," he laughed. "I feel comfortable in any role.

"It is good fun to chop and change the order sometimes and provides flexibility. The skill set is more similar than it is different between each seat, because everyone needs to have a good feel for the boat, along with the ability to buy into and contribute to a good rhythm, and lay down a lot of power.

"There are archetypical characteristics of each seat, though, with the stern pair setting the rhythm, the middle four pulling lots of wattage and the bow pair bringing the whole eight together with finesse and sharp rowing to facilitate maximum run and distance per stroke."