Kate Howey today announced her retirement from competitive judo after an illustrious international career that saw her capture two Olympic medals and a World Championships.

Howey established herself as one of Britain's greatest judokas during her 16-year career. She is the only British judo player to have competed at four Olympic Games and the only British woman to have won two Olympic judo medals.

She retires just weeks after competing at the Athens 2004 Games, when she had the honour of being selected by her fellow TeamGB athletes to carry the Union Flag at the Opening Ceremony.

Howey's competitive career ended in Paris on Sunday (24th October) where it had begun on her senior international debut as a 15-year-old.   The last medal of her career was a silver medal in the European Team Championships.

Howey will continue to be involved in the sport she loves, working as a Regional Co-ordinator for British Judo. Her role includes helping to identify and develop talented young judo players who could be the stars of the future to feed into the World Class Start programme.

Howey, who took up the sport at the age of seven, names her two Olympic medals, her World Championships crown, carrying the Union Flag at Athens 2004 and receiving her MBE from the Queen at Buckingham Palace six years ago as the highlights of her spectacular career.

"I wouldn't swap what I've achieved for anything," she said.

Memories of carrying the Union Flag at the Opening Ceremony at Athens 2004 are fresh in her mind and will stay with her forever.

"It was an amazing atmosphere," she said. "I couldn't take anything in for the first 20 or 30 metres, I was just worried about tripping up or dropping the flag. After that I started enjoying it. It was unbelievable to be there with 75,000 in the stadium shouting and screaming.

"I was particularly pleased for the sport of judo, because it helped to put the sport in the spotlight," she added.

Howey has trained at the University of Bath since 1999, where she has seen the sports facilities develop to be among the best in the country. The recently expanded Sports Training Village at the University boasts a state-of-the-art judo dojo that can rival any in the UK.

She has recently worked with the RFU's National Academy, based at the University of Bath, helping young rugby players develop their tackling skills.

While Howey still plans to take to the mat just for fun, she doesn't plan to get tempting back into competing.

"Judo is like a drug to me," she said. "I'm still going to practice judo, but I won't be competing any more."

Ged Roddy, Director of Sport at the University of Bath, paid tribute to Howey's achievements.

"Kate has been a magnificent ambassador for judo and for TeamBath," he said. "Her achievements have been phenomenal and she has been a terrific role model for young sport people.

"Kate has immense expertise in the sport and we're delighted that she will continue to be involved in judo," he added.

Howey's illustrious career saw her win a bronze medal at the Barcelona 1992 Olympics, when she was one of the youngest members of the British team. She followed that up with a silver medal at Sydney 2000.

Her impressive medal haul also includes a gold at the 1997 World Championships, silvers at the 1993 and 2001 World Championships, and bronzes in 1991 and 1999.

She won European Championship silver medals in 1990, 1993 and 2000, and bronze medals 1993, 1994, 1995, 1997 and 2000.