Two-time world champion rower and Olympic bronze medallist Tracy Cameron has retired just weeks before she was to compete in the Summer Olympics.

Cameron, from Shubenacadie, N.S., won the 2008 Olympic bronze medal in the lightweight women’s double with Melanie Kok before teaming with Lindsay Jennerich to win the 2010 world title.

Although the Olympic team had yet to be named, Cameron was expected to team up with Jennerich again at the 2012 Games in London after winning a race-off against Patricia Obee in Victoria, B.C., this past April. But the duo placed eighth at a World Cup race in Lucerne, Switzerland, two weeks ago, and Cameron felt chemistry with Jennerich was not there.

“This is a very difficult decision — I believe in the Olympic values and have lived my life with excellence, respect and friendship at the forefront of everything that I do,” she said in a release. “With those values as my guide, I knew that I could no longer stay in the double.”

Cameron has been one of Canada’s top lightweight rowers for the last eight years. She was a member of the lightweight quad that won the worlds title in 2005.

Last year, a broken rib kept her from the lightweight women’s double event at world championships, which is the only boat for lightweight women in the Olympic program.