Kate O’Sullivan BEM has been smitten with rowing ever since she was “dragged along” to watch her brother row for the school, though it wasn’t until university that she was afforded the opportunity to try it herself.
Having watched on as her brother rode for his school, Kate was excited to get inside a boat herself, only to be told that she “wasn’t allowed to because I was a girl”. It was only years later when she attended the University of Leeds that she was asked if she wanted to join the rowing team.
The British Rowing Deputy Chair told Fen Regis Trophies: “When I went to university, I was small and loud and the women in my halls of residence asked me if I’d start coxing them.
“That’s how I personally first got into a boat, which was back in 1982…that was my path in.”
Though disappointed to have waited to make her rowing bow, Kate does admit that she has come to understand that, logistically, it would have been difficult due to circumstances at the time.
Kate added: “There were no women’s changing rooms and only a male teacher.”
Tees Rowing Club and Charity Work
The rowing enthusiast has slowly worked her way further up north in England, originally from London, Kate now resides on Teesside and coaches at Tees Rowing Club, as well as at Teesside University.
The hope is that children from all backgrounds will be given a chance to give rowing a go with the launch of a new charity that Kate is helping to establish along with investor Stephen Peel, who won a silver medal representing England at the 1986 Commonwealth Games in the rowing eights.
“I’m trying to get a rowing club established more permanently at Teesside University and Teesside has been brilliant with it. We just don’t have very many rowers.
“I coach them as well. With a guy called Stephen Peel, we’re opening up a new charity on Teesside as well, called Infinity Boat Club, which we are hoping to launch it in September.
“It’s going to be working with the kids in the lowest 10% on the child poverty index. Tees Rowing Club is in the poorest ward of any rowing club in the country.”
Kate also hailed the success of Project Oarsome, an initiative set up by British Rowing in Collaboration with Sport England and the Henley Regatta Stewards Charitable Trust in 2000 that allocated grants of up to £4,000 to refurbish boats used by juniors, of which Tees Rowing Club have been one of the beneficiaries.
“Project Oarsome provided clubs like, Tees Rowing Club, with equipment packages,” she said. “We got six boats out of it and a coaching launch, but it was all about connecting rowing clubs to state schools and that was a game changer for our sport.
“There are loads of really good projects out there at the moment, and there has been for a very long time.”
“My Athletes Have Been Far More Successful Than I Was”
Despite winning a number of trophies at local level, Kate is the first to admit that she was never pulling up trees at a national level and has found far more success as a coach. For her, success is more than just taking home trophies and medals, but is also about seeing her girls and boys smash their personal goals.
“I’ve never won big trophies,” Kate admits. “Have I won the big national events? No, I haven’t. I have won local events, but not the big national events.
“I’ve coached a few crews who have got a few medals at British universities and things like that. My athletes have been far more successful at their rowing than I was.
“I’m prouder of seeing adults and kids that I’ve coached who have overcome some quite big obstacles.
“I’m proud of the people that some of them have become and some of the real challenges that they’ve had the courage to overcome.
“There is an image I’ve always kept in my head. There’s an event every year called the North of England Sprint Championships, which is held at Hollingworth Lake in Rochdale.
“You literally have to spend all day in the lake, getting people in and out of their boats. There was one year and one of our girls, we just couldn’t get her out of the car park. She was petrified.
“My athletes will tell you, we never talk about outcomes ever. It’s always process goals. We always measure things on the process goals.
I sat her down and I said, ‘right, let’s go through process goals. I don’t want to fall in, I don’t want to look like an idiot and I want to come off feeling like I’ve done my best’.
“I ended up being stood in the middle of that lake screaming her name. Somebody said to me ‘I don’t know why you’re so excited, she hasn’t won’. I said ‘but she has’.
“This is a victory for her today, because she hasn’t fallen in. Look at the smile on her face.
“They are the moments for me.”
Kate was appointed as deputy chair of British Rowing in October 2017 and the British Empire Medal for services to rowing in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list in 2021. The Teesside-based rowing enthusiast shows no signs of slowing down any time soon as she continues to work tirelessly for her sport.
