Katie Taylor returned to Ireland a world champion after her win at the AIBA World Boxing Championships, but she is focused on Olympic Gold in London in 2012.

The Wicklow boxer has held the title of world champion in the 60kg category since she won it 2006, but she has been waiting patiently for the International Olympic Committee to make women’s boxing an Olympic sport.

“The Olympics has always been my main goal ever since I started boxing so the next few years is going to be a very exciting few years for me,” she said.

'I'm just going to try to enjoy the next couple of years, keep enjoying my boxing and training and to keep improving all the time.

Taylor will be aiming for gold again at the next world championships (in China in 2012), which also serve as Olympic qualifiers, and Taylor’s weight division is one of three in which women will be allowed to fight in the London Olympics.

The Irish woman had a tough path to this gold medal, with serious opposition from Anastasia Balyakova from Russia in the quarter-finals, Queen Underwood from the U.S. in the semis, and Cheng Dong of China in the final, where she took her third consecutive gold medal in the women’s amateur competition.

She also picked up her second consecutive boxer of the year award, with the AIBA describing her as “one of the best in the business and is … major drawcard, not only in her native country but around the world.”