The North End club rower broke into the elite international arena last year and is keen to consolidate her position ahead of the London Olympics when she competes in Europe over the next two months.
Strack (21) will have the first test with her new lightweight double sculls partner Louise Ayling at the Lucerne World Cup this weekend.
Last year, she won a silver medal in the double sculls at the world under-23 championships in Belarus with Julia Edward and the pair reached the final of the elite world championships at Lake Karapiro.
Strack consolidated her position by winning the gold medal in the lightweight single sculls at the New Zealand championships at Lake Ruataniwha and then took the silver medal in the heavyweight event.
"The primary goal this year is to qualify our lightweight double for the London Olympics," Strack said in an email to the Otago Daily Times before she left for Europe last week.
"But reaching the finals and pushing for medals at both the World Cup and world championships is the immediate goal." The Lucerne regatta this weekend is expected to have a full international field, so the competition will be intense.
To qualify for the Olympics the New Zealand crew must gain a top eight placing at the world championships. The actual crew selection will not be finalised until April next year after the selection trials.
After the World Cup, the squad will be based in Gravelines, in northeast France, near Calais, for six weeks and will then have a few days in Belgium, with the full New Zealand squad, to do some squad pieces, before flying to Slovenia on August 19.
"It will then be full concentration for the world championships on Lake Bled from August 28 to September 4. It is the Olympic qualifying regatta," Strack said.
Strack left for Europe last week with the second part of the New Zealand rowing squad. This includes their training partners, the heavyweight women's double sculls of Fiona Patterson and Anna Reymer, who are also coached by Gary Hay.
The other crews travelling with them are the men's lightweight pair, the elite quadruple sculls and the men's eight.
"We will join up with the rest of the squad who have been in Europe for a month and competed so successfully at the second World Cup in Hamburg," Strack said.
Ayling, who won a silver medal in the single sculls at last year's world championships at Lake Karapiro, is Strack's new doubles partner.
"Like any new partnership it took a while to learn the other person's style and how we could complement each other," Strack said.
"[We] are both specialist single scullers and have quite different styles. Both of us have had to adapt our style, stroke length, rhythm, blade connections and body movement.
"We have had 17 weeks of hard training, so I would like to think that most the kinks have been ironed out by now."
