Australian surfer Stephanie Gilmore says the battle for her sixth world championship title will be her toughest yet.
The 26-year-old is back home after her victory at the tour's penultimate stop in Portugal earlier this month.
But as she prepares to take to the Hawaiian surf at the Target Maui Pro in late November, the five-time world champion admits she's feeling the pressure.
"I'm very nervous, I'm not going to lie," Gilmore told AAP.
"I think it's going to be one of the toughest world title races I've ever been in."
The overall 2014 title is a three-way race between three Aussies - current world No.1 Gilmore, Sally Fitzgibbons and Tyler Wright.
Gilmore and Fitzgibbons have already enjoyed three finals stoushes this year, including a tightly fought contest in Fiji that the former called "a definitive moment of the year".
"I really think Sally and Tyler are in a great headspace," she said.
"I know those girls will be dangerous - they're on the attack."
"They're chasing their very first world title."
Meanwhile, a win in Hawaii would take Gilmore one step closer to Layne Beachley's seven championships.
She says the silver lining to Carissa Moore's 2013 title win is that she doesn't have to shoulder the expectations heaved on the tour's defending champion.
Instead, Gilmore hopes to spend the next month shunning the cross-fit in favour of her usual low key (but undoubtedly successful) training regimen.
"I just like to surf," she said.
It's all part of keeping fit and active - a mantra Gilmore was preaching to an enthusiastic group of Lane Cove West Public School students in Sydney on Friday.
The students are among 40,000 kids expected to take part in the Sanitarium Weet-Bix Kids TRYathlon early next year, in an attempt to become the biggest under-16 triathlon series in the world.
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