The slick-looking vessel is entirely coloured black, with one exception - a white Help for Heroes sticker which is emblazoned on the front. It is in part due to the British charity’s assistance that Paterson will be heading to Italy to make her international debut at the Championships, which begin in the Italian city today and end on August 23.

For a start they have helped to fund the 25-year-old’s kayak, which comes with a price tag of around £2,500 ($3,910/€3,520), but the charity also played a key role in introducing Paterson to the sport in the first place.

During her ninth year of serving in the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers (REME), the Briton saw her military career cut short instantly after being hit by a car. The crash in 2010 nearly cost Paterson her life, with her heart momentarily stopping as doctors battled to save her in hospital. Although they were able to revive her, the crash caused her right leg to become paralysed.

Despite undergoing 12 operations in two years to save the limb, Paterson was eventually forced to have her leg amputated in 2012.

While recovering at the Defence Medical Rehabilitation Centre at Headley Court, Paterson met with a representative of Help for Heroes Sports Recovery, who run a programme providing injured service personnel with the opportunity to take part in around 500 activities a year, comprising many different sports and activities.

The meeting helped to put her on the path towards elite sport with their support enabling her to begin climbing again and learn to adaptively ski, before she eventually took part in a Paralympic talent identification day. Paterson believes the Sports Recovery programme, which has helped over 2,100 people so far, played a vital role in her recovery from the accident.

“Sport was a massive part of my life and a lot of that I thought I had lost when I lost my leg, when I got back into sport and realised I could do it again it was a massive confidence boost,” Paterson said.

“Apart from physically making me fitter again, psychologically it was a huge confidence boost for me to know that actually you can still go climbing, you can ski again, all these things that were normal to me before that I thought I would not be able to do again. I would recommend it to anybody, it completely changed the direction in which my life was going in.”

Having been accepted onto the GB Para-canoe programme in 2014, after her talent was recognised at the talent identification day, Paterson is now seeking to make an impact on the international stage. It follows her performance at the Open Championships last month, an event that doubled as Britain’s World Championship trials, where she earned silver behind her team mate and reigning world champion Emma Wiggs.

While our conversation had occasionally been interrupted by the odd shriek, followed by the sound of a canoeist or rower falling into the undoubtedly cold water, it finally drew to a close with Paterson heading to the lake to begin one of her final training sessions ahead of the World Championships.

As Paterson powered away in her kayak, which has a hull specifically designed for para-athletes, one of her coaches remarked about the rapid progress she had made since joining the GB Canoeing programme, while another paid tribute to her colleague Nick Beighton’s desire for perfection as he also hones his preparations before competing in the K2 event in Milan.

As if to illustrate the point, Beighton ended his session in dialogue with the coaches about how to solve a technical issue which has arisen as a result of injuries sustained in 2009, after stepping on an improvised explosive device (IED) when serving with the British Army in Afghanistan. The incident saw the former Army captain lose both of his legs, while also sustaining injuries elsewhere on his body, including his pelvis.

Like Paterson, Beighton was assisted by the Sport Recovery programme during his rehabilitation where they firstly helped him to transition his skills to rowing. After being accepted onto the GB Rowing programme he joined forces with Sam Scowen to qualify for the London 2012 Paralympics in the mixed sculls, but the pair were unfortunate to miss out on the medals at the Games by finishing in fourth.

Beighton, who also took part in several hand cycling charity rides to boost his recovery, believes the Sport Recovery programme helped him not to be defined by his injuries and convinced him that he was still able to participate in sport despite losing his legs.

“It is about making a statement to yourself that you can actually do stuff and it is not on any competitive level,” he said. “Very early on I thought, I am not going to take this and accept where I am, I am going to do everything I can in life. You cast about for other people who have done it for inspiration and there’s always plenty of people out there. To start with it is just an important thing from a psychological barb to say I can do these things”.

After undergoing more surgeries following London 2012, Beighton was forced to take a break from sport but again, with the aid of the Sport Recovery Programme, he soon found himself taking up Para-canoeing, which is set to make its Paralympic debut at Rio 2016.

Help for Heroes’ Jayne Kavanagh, who works closely with National Governing Bodies in Britain to help injured military personnel move into elite sport, explained the importance of introducing sport back into their lives post-injury.

“We are working with a group of people who have been through some of the most extraordinarily tough times you could see, they have known life before that injury, so you are managing people who have got such a background and a significant trauma,” Kavanagh said.

“You're seeing people who are developing those resilient skills and that is why sport is so powerful in that it has psychological and physiological benefits that enable them to cope with and manage better. That is what we are trying to do, along with their NGBs, to help them transition effectively and manage life after injury and after that transition to sport has its ups and downs as well.”

While the Sport Recovery Programme offers a pathway into elite sport, it also includes a recreational scheme which aims to boost self-confidence and the physical strength of an injured service person after they have suffered injury. Kavanagh feels success stories in the elite performance pathway can provide huge inspiration to people in the early stages of their recovery, citing the success of the first edition of the Invictus Games, which helped to create a near 200 per cent increase in former service personnel contacting the programme.

“We have got people who have suffered extensive trauma at a really important part of your life, in your early adulthood, when you are still developing into the type of person you are and who you are going to be,” she said.

“That is a big change to manage. When you have got someone early on in their recovery who is about to go to a World Championships or is striving to be selected for a Paralympic Games that is inspirational and that enables that person, who is wondering what could be next, to think that could be them. It might not be next week, it might be in two years but that belief and that confidence is something that we can use sport to try and help with.”

While undoubtedly Beighton and Paterson have their own personal targets in mind for the the upcoming World Championships and potentially Rio 2016 next year, the pair are now among the success stories of the Sport Recovery programme. Help for Heroes will hope their performances at the highest level will not only continue their respective recoveries but can also encourage other injured military personnel to get in contact and potentially take part in either the recreational or elite sport aspects of the Sport Recovery programme.

When it is suggested to him that he could now be a source of inspiration for others, Beighton at first seems somewhat surprised by the suggestion.

“I am not going to say I am some kind of paragon of selflessness as ultimately I am doing it for myself at the end of the day and for my own aims,” he admits. “But as a consequence of that, if it gives other people the courage to go out and try these things, absolutely brilliant.”