His original aim might have been to pursue a career in basketball but Falkirk’s Cameron Buchan insists he has no regrets about swapping the court for a rowing boat as he chases his Olympic dream.

A promising basketball player and member of the Great Britain Under-20 team, Buchan left Scotland to head to America in search of a basketball scholarship, eventually ending up at Kent School, Connecticut.

But with the emphasis on doing more than one sport during the course, the former Denny High School student tried his hand at rowing, and immediately found himself drawn to the sport.

A switch to Northeastern University in Boston then followed to continue his progression, while this summer he arrived back in Britain to join the famous Leander Club – the most successful rowing club in the world having seen its members win 111 Olympic medals over the years.

The advantages for Buchan are numerous, not least getting the chance to train regularly with seasoned internationals such as London 2012 champion Alex Gregory, and Buchan believes he couldn’t be in a better place to further his career.

“When I was in America, you hear guys talking about Leander, and it’s a worldwide name, and in the rowing world, you see Leander and you know it’s associated with top-class performance,” said Buchan, who moved back from America in June.

“That’s pretty much why I ended up here. I wanted to make sure I’m putting myself in a good position to step on from where I’m going."

“To cut a long story short the rowing coach at my university in America asked me to try rowing out because you have to do more than one sport over the whole year."

“So I tried rowing out and over the two months that I rowed, I seemed to pick it up quicker, and I was enjoying it more than I was basketball, so I spoke to the coach and he told me I could either go to school for rowing or school for basketball. I spoke to my parents and after that decided to do rowing."

“The coach from Northeastern came and saw me row and decided that I was good enough to, or potentially good enough to be recruited and go there to university.”

Buchan has already made sure to hit the ground running at Leander, taking part in the British Rowing Championships in Nottingham earlier this month, where he helped the Leander A men’s eight crew to a silver medal.

And the 22-year-old admits he is already seeing the improvement in his rowing as he edges closes to his dream of one day competing at an Olympic Games.

“Coming to Leander was really good to step on from my uni, having big guys pulling much bigger numbers than myself,” he added.

“My ultimate rowing ambitions are to be in the fastest boat I can possibly be on the water, and hopefully that would mean us winning some sort of medal on the highest possible stage, hopefully the Olympics.”

As Leander Club launched their ‘Row to Rio’ campaign Cameron Buchan spoke of Leander’s place as the most successful rowing club in the world, with 111 Olympic medals won by its members.