An additional €925,000 of funding will be made available to aid athletes with their preparation for next summer's Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro.

The announcement was made today by Minister of State for Tourism and Sport, Michael Ring, and the extra funding will be allocated to sports governing bodies in Ireland.

Minister Ring said: "The Government is providing increased funding of €3m to Sport Ireland for 2016. I am pleased to say that within this, an amount of €925,000 is being invested specifically to assist sporting bodies in their preparations for the Rio Games. 

"Through this investment, Sport Ireland will support specific plans by NGBs for the Rio Games. I am delighted to make this additional investment available in 2016, on top of a special €1m allocation that was provided last year to assist NGBs in their Rio preparations.

"2016 is a very important year for Irish athletes and high performance NGBs and I wish them all well as their preparations intensify in the run-up to the 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games."

As well as extra money available, the Government announced an increase of €3m in funding for Sport Ireland next year in the recent budget.