A Pembrokeshire athlete is heartbroken after narrowly missing out on a medal in the Olympics.

Micky Beckett from Solva was in with a good chance of winning a bronze in the Men’s Dinghy ILCA 7 medal race.

Beckett came excruciatingly close to winning bronze, only to have it snatched from him.

During a short window of breeze Micky Beckett sailed a beautiful race and was in second, enough to secure him the bronze medal. The race committee then chose to abandon the action with just one short leg to go.

The restarted race started in the worst possible way – Micky was given a penalty on the start line for supposedly using his body to aid his boat’s motion through the water.

He fought back but was handed two more penalties during the race, relegating him to tenth. The result saw him finish sixth overall.

“To have the bronze medal taken away so close to the end of the first race was pretty tough. But I was like ‘this is sport, this is sailing in particular, this does happen’,” Micky said on the British Sailing Team’s update.

“The second race chewed me up, spat me out and I went from fourth with a really good chance of bronze to sixth, which is just a bit crushing for me. In time I'll get over it. It'll sink in in time but right now it's pretty tough.”

Solva local Micky learnt to sail at the age of five at a small sailing school his dad ran in the village in a hand made boat made by his father.

He began competing aged 10 and the Olympics has long been his dream.

"I would love to represent not just the UK but Wales and Pembrokeshire at the Olympics,” he told the Western Telegraph before the games.

He has previously said that the support from Pembrokeshire keeps him going during competitions.

“The support I get from home is fantastic,” said Micky. “I have to spend a lot of time abroad. It can feel pretty far from home sometimes, but there's genuinely nowhere I look forwards to going to more than Solva.

“I can't describe how nice it is to go home, hang around at the harbour and catch up with people I've known since I was a kid.

“People are always really interested in my sailing and want to know the latest about what I've been up to, it's fantastic to always have that kind of support.”