00:00 Well I started, my brother got me into rowing as a sort of joke down in London at the Lee
00:04 Rowing Club and he said why don't you just try this for a laugh. I fell in, I was really
00:07 useless and then one thing led to another and then I won my first race and that was
00:12 it, I was hooked. And then I kind of went up to Notts County and then to cut a long
00:16 story short, yes I've managed to get quite a high level in rowing. And when I came across
00:21 that line first at Henley, when I won my Henley medal, I just want people to feel what that's
00:27 like because that's really special, so that's why we're here really.
00:30 You say you got quite high with it, you rowed for the country.
00:34 Yes I did, yeah. It's not the sort of thing you tell people in pub, hey I did this, because
00:39 it's nice to be a bit modest but we've got our little cabinet, I've got my cabinet, I've
00:43 got my medals, so I have rowed for Great Britain, yes.
00:46 And now you're here with the Medway Towns Rowing Club, tell me how that partnership
00:50 came about.
00:51 Well we tried rowing a while back but then unfortunately I had to have some arm surgery
00:56 so I had a ligament so I couldn't do anything. And George came down and he wants to row,
01:01 he's very keen, so I just started off with taking my son down, hey let's get you in a
01:05 boat, let's see what's happened. It was driven by him. And so we went down to the Medway
01:10 Towns Rowing Club, they're really friendly, really nice people, but they just didn't have
01:14 enough, you know, it's like there weren't enough people there. So they said, you know,
01:19 why don't you come and be the coach down here, you know, we'd love to have a coach here and
01:23 just sort of fire things up a bit. So that was like last week. So things are happening
01:27 quite fast.
01:28 Yeah, pretty quick. So George, you were inspired by your dad to take part yourself, is he any
01:33 good?
01:34 He is very good, yeah. He's a good coach and a good father.
01:36 Okay, great. No, that's brilliant. So you've not been too long taking it on yourself, how
01:42 have you been finding it?
01:43 Well I started rowing at school about two years ago and ever since I started I just
01:49 haven't been able to get off the water. Whenever I look at the river I'm always like, when
01:53 can I next get on the water?
01:55 I mean, it's quite a lovely river as well, isn't it? You get all sorts there. We were
01:59 hearing over the weekend there's some dolphins in there, you get the big cargo ships, river
02:04 sailboats, all that kind of thing. So to be a part of that, tell us what is the River
02:07 Medway actually like?
02:08 Yeah, I mean, it's a difficult piece of water at times, but if you get it right, you get
02:13 high tide, low wind, it's perfect. Like the last couple of days have been beautiful, haven't
02:17 they? The mirror, when you see the water, if anyone drives over that bridge and it's
02:20 really like a flat mirror, that's what we love. It's a good piece of water. I mean,
02:24 there are issues with things going into the river, like sewage and stuff, which isn't
02:29 good, but we're hoping that that's going to get cleaned up a bit because there's a lot
02:32 of things that need to happen in order for us to make this work. Because it's a big objective
02:37 that we're setting ourselves. We set a high goal here in Kent and it's good, we can't
02:41 wait, but it's a good club, they're nice people.
02:44 You've got a taster session happening this weekend for people to come out and try it
02:48 out for the first time. George, you're fairly new to this, what's your advice to somebody
02:52 that's going to come out and try it for the first time?
02:55 Don't worry about if you find it really difficult, just enjoy yourself and remember, it takes
03:00 time.
03:01 As well, I was looking up, there's a film that's recently come out about the US Olympic
03:06 squad and Joel Edgerton's character, he plays the coach, so he's quite shouty, quite strict
03:12 with them. What style of coach are you with the group, which style would you like to be?
03:19 One thing about, I think there is definitely a lack of coaches in the whole of Medway and
03:23 Kent, a lot of the clubs here, they really need coaches and it's a real problem. But
03:28 my style, I'm not going to be shouting at people, but I do get really passionate about
03:32 the sport and I'm in there saying 'come on, we're going to win this' and I get really
03:36 carried away because I want to be in that boat with them. So I'm very, very passionate
03:41 about it. But I think my style is, if you're there in the water, because I was coached
03:45 by some of the top coaches in the UK and they're just watching you and it's like 'they're
03:51 watching me' and you just say one thing, work on that, come off the water and next
03:57 thing and you come off feeling you're going a little bit faster than when you went on
04:01 the water.
04:02 And it's such a team sport as well, isn't it? So how do you get a group that maybe didn't
04:06 know each other before to really get into that synchronised style of rowing together?
04:11 Yes, that's really important. We'll have a lot of people coming on Saturday, which
04:15 is great, they're all really welcome, all ages, abilities, well actually not all ages,
04:18 over the age of 15 that is. And you'll get different rowing styles, so a coach's job
04:23 is really to say 'ok, well this person's going back a bit too quick, so it's getting
04:26 all together'. But yes, that film, we were sitting in that film together thinking 'do
04:30 you know what, I think we should do this' and then everything just happened, it's
04:36 really good. It's a real good story because the club really needs some help. I think it
04:41 takes a community to win a gold medal, it's not just a team, it's a whole thing, it's
04:45 parents, it's coaches, it's people, every single cup of tea that's made at that club
04:49 is going towards that medal.
04:51 That's great and that's the plan, isn't it? You want to take this group to Henley
04:54 and actually this group's been around for years, this club, they actually won it before
04:59 in 1893, so is that the kind of plan to go back to history?
05:03 They didn't win it, they lost in the final in a White Falls Challenge Cup.
05:07 Of course, yes, no but they got it.
05:09 So we're thinking, it's kind of weird actually because we were in the club and it's got
05:12 these old silver pots and things and you think 'god, it's got like 1860s', it's
05:16 a really, Chatham, this Medway's got a real history of rowing and we've got to revive
05:23 this, so we're out to do something quite special but we're being quite modest about
05:28 it I think because if you start to say 'oh yeah, we're going to win Henley' because
05:31 it's a very, very difficult event to win. It's like the Wimbledon of tennis, it's
05:35 very difficult.
05:36 Now of course, so what does the club look like at the moment? I know you've got 40
05:40 boats down there.
05:41 We've got 40 boats but the club obviously needs some money. What is really sad is that
05:50 when we were talking about this last night, when we go to Henley, the schools that are
05:54 winning, Eton, Bradley, Heddington, they've got money but you don't see any schools,
06:01 or at least very few schools from this part of the country that are in the national schools,
06:06 regattas or winning Henley and I think that's really sad and I think they need to have some
06:10 investment. Whoever is the MP around here, they've got to do a better job than this
06:14 because there's no money going into sport around Medway, they've got to sort it out.
06:18 George, you're a youngster as part of this, do you think this is something that people
06:22 maybe leaving school around that age should be looking into?
06:26 Definitely, I think we used to have Kent University come down, it's really suitable for those
06:32 ages and you make great friends doing it.
06:36 Make great friends, that's the hope. Thank you both for joining us very much and all
06:41 the best with the future of this group.
06:43 Thanks for having us, it's been a pleasure.
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