ON the cusp of world glory and nursing a genuine Olympic Games dream, teen queen kick-boxer Courtney Catterson has never looked back since donning gloves and shinguards.

The 15-year-old and her brother Macaulay, who is 17, next week jet out to Slovakia for the world cadet kick-boxing championships.

Since the age of seven Courtney has been competing in a sport which to the outsider is tough and violent. Her brother started when he was six.

During the intervening years the Cattersons have gathered no fewer than 21 British titles across three of the sport’s various organisations.

Currently Courtney is the reigning WAKO British champion, winner of two national SIMAC crowns and in her last outing before the world championships struck gold in the King’s Battleground show held in Nottingham, while Macaulay, who is soon to join the Royal Air Force, has triumphed in 21 contests in 2012, including several on the SIMAC circuit – a national league for junior kick-boxers.

Besides actual competition, training is vigorous and rigorous, their regimes consisting of travelling to Derby two nights a week for tuition at the Kodared Club run by Great Britain kick-boxing coach Dwayne Reed as well as a brace of sessions each week at the new Walmgate headquarters of York Boxing Club, which is run under the auspices of the Jack Raine Foundation.

Both Courtney and Macaulay have been so motivated by the Olympic Games in London that each are contemplating a move into boxing in the bid to fulfil a dream of competing at the next Olympics in Brazil’s Rio de Janieiro in 2016.

The elder Catterson’s aspiration will likely be aided by the chance of graduating to elite sports training during his career in the RAF.

But for Courtney, now entering her final year at Canon Lee School , it will mean giving up a sport at which she has excelled for nigh on a decade.

Asked whether she regretted taking up the sport she said: “Never. Kick-boxing has opened up quite a few doors for me.

“I’ve met so many different people and enjoyed so many opportunities and I know some of my friends have said they wished they had got into something like it when they were younger.

“I mean how many youngsters at my age have travelled all over the world competing in a sport that they love.

“That’s why it’s going to be a big decision for me to switch over to boxing.

“The thought of competing at an Olympics is special. It’s something I’m going to have to think about really hard.”