Reigning Olympic pole vault champion Steve Hooker says he has been overwhelmed by the support he has received since revealing his mental confidence issues and still believes he can make it to London.
Hooker, who won gold in Beijing in 2008 with a vault of 5.96 metres, announced on Thursday that he was taking time away from competition to deal with performance anxiety.
With the London Games less than six months away, those issues have left Hooker with an uphill battle to return in time to qualify for his third Olympics.
Hooker must meet the 5.78m A qualifying mark - a far cry from his 5.00m best in an event in Adelaide a fortnight ago - at a sanctioned event before June 11 to ensure his spot in the Olympic team.
But the 29-year-old also reportedly could make it to London at Athletics Australia's discretion because he has posted a B qualifying mark since May 2011.
Hooker, who is hoping to return to competition in May, said his only focus now though was on ensuring he could return to his best as quickly as possible.
"You need to build an Olympic campaign off a solid base and that base wasn't there yet, so we're going back to basics," he said.
"We're looking at the big picture. Things were progressing okay but it wasn't solid. I think Adelaide was a pretty good snapshot of where I was at."
"We thought the risk was if we kept going through the season the problems that I've been having would degenerate and get worse and not have enough time to try to get another proper preparation in to compete again and try to qualify."
"I think I can [qualify for the Olympics]. I've got a really good team here at WAIS and all the people at AA have all been really supportive."
"I've got more support than I could possibly have imagined and I believe I can do it."
Hooker said the decision to take a break from competition had been made by his long-time coach Alex Parnov.
"It was kind of out of my hand, it was Alex's decision to shut things down. I'm following his advice and I think it's good advice," Hooker said.
"Sometimes I run in and I don't take off, it's as simple as that. There's a feeling like you can be lost on the runway, not comfortable or you've just got too many thoughts in your head and it just doesn't happen … but I'm confident I can work through it."