HARTLEY Wintney badminton star Viki Williams is taking a step into the unknown at the World University Games in South Korea.

Williams has been named as part of a 67-strong team who will head to Gwangju from July 3 to July 14 for the latest edition of the biennial event.

The games will represent the biggest challenge of Williams’ budding career to date.

But buoyed by a season in which she has helped Loughborough University women seal the Championship title, the 20-year-old refuses to be daunted by the prospect ahead, intent on using it as a stepping stone to bigger things.

“It will be such a good experience because the tournaments that I play at the moment are mainly European-based whereas there we’re playing people from all over Asia and other parts of the world,” she said. “It’s such a different style game and as I move up and play all the world class tournaments it will be really useful.

“I know when we play Asian players it’s going to be a longer game than against Europeans so we’ve been practising that in training to prepare for that.”

She added: “This year at Loughborough I’ve had two main coaches and they’ve worked with me and my doubles partner. They’ve helped us improve so much this year, the most I’ve ever improved.

“I have been training so hard, I just want to play the best I can in Korea. A medal would be great but I just want to play the best I can.”

British Universities & College Sport (BUCS) is the governing body for higher education sport in the UK, representing 170 institutions and facilitating 52 sport programmes. BUCS will be sending a delegation of Great Britain’s next generation of elite athletes to the World University Games (Summer Universiade) being held in Gwangju, Korea, between July 4 and 14. For more information visit www.bucs.org.uk.