Champion rowers hope for wet and windy Olympics!
One of Cork and Ireland’s greatest Olympic medal hopes feel that the often uncomfortable conditions they train in here in Cork give them a real edge.
Champion rowers Paul O’Donovan and Fintan McCarthy, who won gold medals in the last Olympics in Tokyo said that they are well prepared for competition given that they often train in wet and windy conditions in Ireland.
Paul and Fintan spent much of their time training at the National Rowing Centre in Farran, as they prepare to represent Ireland at the Paris Olympics this summer and they might be hoping that the weather is less than perfect there!
Paul explained: “Flat calm conditions, not too hot, not too cold are the easiest to row in. Fortunately, we don’t have too much of that here and we get loads of the harder stuff to row in where it’s windy, wet, cold and raining and we probably get more of that than any other country in the world.
“So when the weather is in any way not perfect we often find that we are almost best prepared for it. We almost relish a bit of adverse weather.”
Speaking about preparing for competitions Fintan said: “It doesn’t phase us too much whether other crews are doing something different, especially in a sport like rowing when you’re not able to slow anyone down or affect anyone else’s speed. For that reason it’s very much about us being focused on ourselves and how fast we can get in the time that’s left in the race.”
The gold medal winning duo were speaking during a video recording for Rowing Ireland partners, global real estate advisory firm Avison Young.
Principal & Managing Director of Avison Young in Ireland, Fergal Burke said: “At Avison Young we’re powered by people and that’s one of the reasons we became associated with rowing. We’ve seen the sensational growth in popularity of the sport over that period and it’s really inspirational for the younger members of our team, in particular, to see the effort and dedication of the rowers. We are immensely proud to continue to support Rowing Ireland.”
Paul said: “We are very grateful for all the support that we receive. It’s nothing but positivity and it’s incredible how much everyone gets behind a sport like rowing, especially with the big event coming up later this summer.
“I think for us, we got into rowing for our own reasons and wanted to be the best for ourselves and do the best that we can do. For us, it was never about trying to please other people or make other people happy, to meet other people's expectations.
“We’re just happy that we are doing the thing that we like and we are making progress in the direction that we want to go in. That was, and still is, the most important thing for us,” he concluded.