How to be a winner: Hockeyroo Anna Flanagan on what keeps her driven

ANNA Flanagan has set her sights on gold at the Rio Olympics, and she’s on a mission to make every woman in Australia a champion too.

Anna Flanagan has been playing hockey since the age of four. Picture: Red Bull

ANNA Flanagan was born to succeed, and this year she’s set her sights on world domination.

The 24-year-old Hockeyroos defender is going for gold in Rio, but on top of playing matches and following an intense training regime, she’s an ambassador for the Nike Training Club Tour, which bring its popular seven-hour workout for women back to Sydney on Saturday, March 19.

“I think this experience is so empowering for women to all get together and get active,” she told news.com.au after a tough workout with the Nike Master Trainers on a boat in the city’s sparkling harbour. “Anything is possible if you work hard.”

Anna started playing hockey at four and was coached by her father Fred, a Canberra PE teacher, until she was 18 years old and joined the national team. “My whole family played,” she said. “I loved all sports growing up and played tennis and did athletics until I was 15 and had to choose.”

In 2010, she played for the Australian side that won gold at the Commonwealth Games, sealing the win with seconds to go, in one of the best moments of her career.

The 24-year-old was World Hockey Player of the Year in 2013. Picture: Adam Head

Two years later, she scored the only Australian goal in the Hockey World League final, and was named World Young Player of the Year.

Since the team came fifth at the 2012 Olympics, they’ve raised their ranking and are aiming for the very top at the Rio Olympics in August. “Being ranked third in the world at the moment we have a real medal chance,” said Anna. “We will of course be aiming for gold.”

Anna is a social media darling, with more than 50,000 Instagram followers, 20,000 on Twitter, her own blog and a degree in journalism bringing in the writing gigs. In December, she created an emotional video as part of an Australian beef advertising campaign, in which she admitted she felt there were many things she felt were unsaid between her and her dad.

“He was very hard on me and I was a bit of a brat as well,” she says in the four-and-a-half minute clip, which shows her thanking him for everything he did for her growing up.

The video “made a lot of people cry who had been in similar situations with their kids or parents,” she told news.com.au.

The Hockeyroo, right, is an ambassador on the Nike Training Tour.

“My dad is the reason I am where I am today. We had lots of fights but he always wanted me to be the best I could and use the talent I had.”

These days, a typical day for Anna looks like this: “I’ll wake up and make scrambled eggs and mushrooms for breakfast. I then train for around three hours where we do fitness to start, hockey skills after, then head to ice baths.

“We usually go to lunch in groups and have salads or wraps. After this we will head to the gym and if I am tired I’ll have a coffee or Red Bull. As a snack I like to eat almonds and fruit. After the gym, I’m pretty tired so I watch some TV and make dinner, usually meat and vegetables, for my boyfriend and I before having an early night to do it all again.”

For this talented young sportswoman, “getting fit is a lifestyle” and the “sense of achievement after a hard session” drives her every day.

And of course, “that winning feeling’’.

The NTC Tour takes place in Sydney, Melbourne and Auckland this Saturday, March 19.