We're proud to be British Rowing's Official Legal Partner, helping the organisation and its 530 clubs and 30,000 members with a variety of legal needs.
To celebrate the new partnership, we spoke to three of British Rowing's top athletes. Read their interviews to get to know the people behind the medals.
Charlotte is a double world U23 champion sculler now racing in the senior GB Rowing Team.
She's also seen success in the senior world championships. She won silver in the women's eight at the 2016 Rotterdam World Championships and achieved high placings in multiple disciplines at the 2018 Plovdiv World Championships.
Ollie has represented Great Britain since a junior and now aims to compete in the Tokyo Olympic Games.
Ollie won gold in the men’s coxed pair at the 2016 World Rowing Championships. In 2017, he was part of the winning Blue Boat crew in the men’s Boat Race and rowed in the men’s eight at the Sarasota-Bradenton World Rowing Championships.
Since taking up the sport at university, Melissa has had an impressive array of results as an u23 and now looks to continue her success at senior level.
After silver and bronze medals at the 2014 and 2015 U23 World Championships, Melissa finished seventh in the single sculls at the FISU World University Rowing Championships in 2016. In her first season as a senior in 2017, she came sixth in the women's four at the Lucerne World Cup and fourth in women's pair at the World Championships.
She also came fifth in the women's quad at the 2018 World Championships.
Charlotte's Q&A
How did you first get into rowing? What attracted you to the sport?
I’m not too sure what attracted me to rowing at the start, but I think I picked it up as it was summer and rowing on the river seemed like good fun.
My sister was already rowing at the time, so there’s probably some truth in me being a typical younger sibling and copying her!
What skills does a good rower need?
A large and varied skillset! I think it depends on the individual, as the skills vary between athletes.
Generally, I think there’s a trend of being driven, self-aware and competitive (obviously)! Other good skills are being patient, rational and a good crewmate.
What’s your training routine like, and how has it been impacted by the pandemic?
I typically train six days per week, averaging around 30 hours of training time per week. I have a mix of strength, water and land-based sessions, as well as high-intensity work.
I like the structure, so when I was at home training in lockdown I had to make sure I stayed to a similar routine. We’ve been back in our training centre for a while now, and I’m incredibly grateful that we have an elite sport exemption which means we can continue fairly normally.
What advice would you give to someone looking to start rowing for the first time?
Find your local clubs and see if you can get to know the coaches and athletes. Make sure you pick one that suits you and whose atmosphere you like.
Picking one that suits you best is really important, especially if you’re choosing between a more race-orientated or a recreational club!
What’s your proudest rowing moment to date and why?
It’s so hard to choose my proudest rowing moment, but I’m most proud of racing in the 2019 GB final trials. My father had just been diagnosed with terminal cancer and managed to come and watch me and my sister race. I didn’t know he was coming to watch, and seeing him cheering as I came through the second part of the race was incredible.
I ended up coming third which I was happy with, but for me, I was just so proud to have raced with my dad watching. Even now after he’s passed, this is a race that I often reflect on, as I know how much it meant to him, and equally to me.
What’s been your biggest challenge in rowing so far and why?
I’ve been incredibly lucky to not encounter too many upsets in rowing, but I found balancing training and university pretty challenging.
To support being at university and also my rowing, I had to wake up around 5am to get a session in before cycling 15 miles to university. Then I had to cycle back and go to work, then get another two training sessions in before getting home around 8pm and trying to study.
I really enjoyed it for the most part, but it was definitely challenging!
What would be your dream achievement in rowing and why?
Easy: an Olympic gold! When I started out rowing I couldn’t really comprehend the idea of being an Olympic medallist, so to achieve this now would be huge.
Often I think back to how I felt as a younger athlete, and I like to think I’m now making 15 year old me proud!
What do you do in your life outside of rowing?
I tend to spend my time tutoring, doing bits of writing and a large amount of baking. Where I can, I also love to get out on my bike as I love the freedom I get from it.
I also bought a 50 year old car as my first car, and I’ve spent a fair bit of time trying to combat the rust it loves to acquire. At the moment I seem to be winning, just…
What are you most looking forward to in 2021 and beyond?
More racing, a bit more normality in life and starting my law conversion. I plan to work in sports law in the future so I’m really excited to get going!
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Ollie's Q&A
How did you first get into rowing? What attracted you to the sport?
I first got into rowing aged 12 when my dad started rowing at our local rowing club in Windsor.
What skills does a good rower need?
Drive. A good rower wants to push themselves.
What’s your training routine like, and how has it been impacted by the pandemic?
My training regime is pretty regimented: three sessions a day, at set times throughout the day. The pandemic put that out the window, so most rowers had to create our own routines.
What advice would you give to someone looking to start rowing for the first time?
It’s a wonderful team sport. You should always make the most of that.
What’s your proudest rowing moment to date and why?
Winning the World Championships in 2016 in the coxed pair. We were the non-travelling Olympic spares, so we trained through the Games in case we were needed. The World Championships were four weeks after the Games.
It was a lot of solo training and staying positive, and we didn’t get to race that much that season. So to win at the Worlds felt like a suitable ending to that journey.
What’s been your biggest challenge in rowing so far and why?
Getting a stress fracture on one of my ribs in 2018. It put me out of the boat during an important time for almost three months.
What would be your dream achievement in rowing and why?
I feel like I should say winning the Olympic Games, but it would actually be to feel content with whatever the result, and how we trained and performed.
What do you do in your life outside of rowing?
I studied history and international relations at both Oxford and the London School of Economics, so I really enjoy carrying on my engagement in those subjects. I’ve studied Arabic, French and Economics while rowing, and I’m really interested in the subject of high performance.
What are you most looking forward to in 2021 and beyond?
A really exciting period of training and preparing for the Olympic Games, the Olympic Games themselves, then a holiday. And then finding out what I’m going to do next in life.
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Melissa's Q&A
How did you first get into rowing? What attracted you to the sport?
I began rowing when I started at university in Cambridge. I was probably drawn by the beauty of the river and the chance to be part of a team with friends.
What skills does a good rower need?
Perseverance, the capacity to build camaraderie for crew boats, and some capacity for pain tolerance!
What’s your training routine like, and how has it been impacted by the pandemic?
Lockdown meant that we went from training twice or three times a day together as a squad to being apart for four months.
I was lucky in spending lockdown living with a teammate and her family. We’d keep each other company through the long sessions, and built a gym by putting a metal bar up in tree branches for pull-ups. We’d also fill a rucksack with rocks for squats, and do bench press from within her parent’s swing seat!
I’ve been dealing with the ups and downs of a series of injuries this season, so my training routine’s very different to normal at the moment. But it’s great to have the support of the British Rowing team.
What advice would you give to someone looking to start rowing for the first time?
Rowing is how I’ve made some of the closest friendships in my life. It helped me find balance through university and develop who I was as a person. So my biggest piece of advice is to join a club and just start!
Also, Sudocrem is my top tip for helping with blisters!
What’s your proudest rowing moment to date and why?
Either stroking the Cambridge Blue Boat to a record-breaking Boat Race win after losing it three times, coming fourth at the World Championships with my best friend that summer in the Women’s Pair, or qualifying the Women’s Quad for the Tokyo Olympics in 2019. Each time I was competing with people I’d become really close to, and still am.
What’s been your biggest challenge in rowing so far and why?
Probably the series of injuries this year. I qualified for the Women’s Quad in 2019, and was selected for the Olympic Squad in that boat in 2020 before the Games were postponed. So it was really hard to deal with my body not making it through an extra year.
But I’ve had a massive amount of support from teammates, coaches past and present, support staff and others in the rowing community. That’s definitely made a big difference.
What would be your dream achievement in rowing and why?
It would’ve been to compete at this summer’s Olympics. Now, I’m having to think through new goals, but also reflect on all that’s been achieved and enjoyed over these last years.
What do you do in your life outside of rowing?
I went back to Cambridge during 2016-2018 to study their Affiliated Law course, and have worked as an environmental legal researcher for a couple of organisations over the last few years.
Since last April, though, I’ve been working as part of Champions for Earth, an organisation looking to increase the impact that athletes can have on sustainability as role models and advocates for the planet.
Last September, I helped mobilise over 300 GB Olympians and Paralympians in a letter to the Prime Minister encouraging a green recovery. The athletes included household names like Mo Farah, Paula Radcliffe, Steve Redgrave, the Brownlee brothers and Becky Adlington.
Since early 2021 I’ve been working on a project called OLYEarth+, helping to make Team GB’s participation in the Olympics have a net-positive environmental impact. It really excites me that the qualities we nurture as athletes – ambition, resilience, collaboration, developing a legacy – can map so closely onto how we need to be approaching environmental progress.
What are you most looking forward to in 2021 and beyond?
Cheering on my teammates during the Olympic Games, especially after their great performances at the European Championships and World Cup II this season. And continuing my work with Champions for Earth.
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