By Adam, Alex, Matt, Siobhan, Will and David from Homewood School, Kent
Olympic School Reporters, Beijing |
  Paul Thompson, head coach of the lightweights and women's crews |
Whilst at the rowing event, Homewood were privileged to have been granted interviews by three separate members of the Great British Olympic Rowing Team. First we interviewed Paul Thompson, head coach of the lightweights and women's crews and coach for the women's quad. We asked him how he felt the team were doing so far. "It's going well so far. We've got two crews in the final already and we're moving well within the heats so we're hoping to get to the finals for a few medals." How they had acclimatized in preparation for the event? "Well it's really challenging conditions," Paul replied, "so they've been in heat chambers back home. There's nothing here we haven't prepared for, but it's still pretty harsh conditions." We asked about the quality of facilities in Beijing. "It's been really really good, there's no shortage of man power that's for sure!" joked Paul glancing at the security guards lining our area. "And how about looking forward to 2012," we asked, "have you got some younger hopefuls you've started training up?"  |  We had our own opening ceremony at the hotel |
"We've got a world class start programme that's been out in schools, looking for different athletes. One of them is about to race at five o'clock, one of the great duo's here. We've been through the sporting giants programme with UK sport so we've got a few coming in and a lot of it's going to depend on how they do this weekend." What did he think of the opening ceremony? "Well we had our own opening ceremony at the hotel!" Paul replied, "we were about to race the next day." We then commented on Paul's accent and asked about his history in rowing. He explained that he was Australian and that this was his fifth Olympics. "I've had three with Australia and this is my second with Britain. I got some results with Australian teams and got invited to Britain in 2000". We asked how training techniques differed between Australia and Britain? "Because of the changes in the seasons," Paul explained, "in Australia it's more a two season year whereas in Europe it's more of a one season year so it's different training."  David Tanner OBE, Performance Manager for the GB Rowing Team |
This was then followed up by an interview with David Tanner OBE, Performance Manager for the GB Rowing Team. David was interested in the 'Towards the Olympics' project Homewood is taking part in and was very supportive of our work. David was very helpful in putting the event into context for us, telling us a little about the events we were seeing. He also explained to us the benefits for the team of being in such close accommodation as the other rowers had to travel an hour to get to the course whilst the British team were staying a couple of minutes from the start line. We joked about the clear advantage it had just given our men's eights as they had just beaten the champions USA across the line! He went on to explain about difficulties in booking accommodation as other teams had tried to move the team out in their favour. He finally commented that as well as featuring on TV whilst interviewing him we could probably be heard on Radio 5 live as we were being so loud in our vocal support! We finally caught up with Mark Banks, one of two coaches of the successful men's eights team. We congratulated him on his team's success and asked him how the team had prepared so well for their event? "We came here ten days ago," Mark replied, "so the boys are really well acclimatised." He then went on to mirror David's comments on the convenience of such close accommodation for the team. We asked who else should we be looking out for. "Well we have chances for about seven or eight medals," Mark replied, "in the women's quad, women's double (who had just completed their first race!), women's eights and in the men, men's eights, men's four, men's double and then in the lightweights, lightweights men's four and lightweights men's double."  Mark Banks, one of two coaches of the successful men's eights team |
We then commented on the growing success of rowing in Britain and asked if the rowing world had changed at all since the well documented success of Team GB in recent Olympics and World Championships. "We haven't felt it yet as that's more the development side but we're hoping it feeds through to 2012," Mark said. With more younger people coming through, we asked if he has his eye on any talent. "Always, always!" Mark exclaimed. He then wished us luck and very kindly offered to take our Union Jack to be signed by the team. We are incredibly grateful and overwhelmed by team GB's continued support of School Report and wish them all the luck possible for their races to come. Thank you GB Rowing - we're supporting you all the way!!
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