Rowing in Australia with Sport Lived – work hard, play hard…

Commitment, stamina and a hard working attitude may be key tools for any good rower, but recently, for Junior World Championship Winner George Nash of Surrey, it’s been all about having the time of his life. He’s just finished a gap year scheme with Sport Lived; they placed him in Melbourne, Australia to teach rowing at a top school there, before he took off on a trip around the world from which he will return home to studying general engineering at Cambridge University in September. It has been a whirlwind experience for George, who has enjoyed being able to mix a gap year experience with honing his skills: “I booked a trip to Australia with Sport Lived as a rowing coach mainly to find out how the Aussies do it and I thought Melbourne would be a great city to live in while I was there…it was an amazing few weeks.”

Coaching his crew on The Yarra in Melbourne

Since he was thirteen George has been interested in rowing, and his talent earned him a place on his school’s first eight in his third year, when he began training every day. His decision to take a gap year with Sport Lived gave him the choice of two coaching terms – October to December or January to March, of which he selected the latter – and three major cities: Melbourne, Perth and Brisbane. George knows he made the right decision for himself, saying: “The Sport Lived programme is awesome down in Melbourne”.

Serious coaching started in earnest immediately, on a 5 day trip to the country on as part of his school’s training camp. ‘It was really good to get to know everyone and learn how that particular school liked to do things.’ George was made co-coach of the year 10 C crew who he said were a ‘really good bunch of guys who achieved a lot on camp.’  No stranger to early mornings, George coached rowing weekdays between 6-8am, then again between 3.30 – 5pm. There also were sessions on Saturday mornings, which provided extra time on the still, beautiful Yarra River. Of the rowing opportunities he was given whilst out in Melbourne, George said:  “The school that I’m working for has awesome facilities and loads of motivated kids and there’s loads of coaching to do if you want to. Sport Lived take care of finding you the coaching job.”

George with Dr Karl!

In addition to coaching, Sport Lived also arranged for George to join one of Melbourne’s best rowing clubs so he could row as well as coach rowing during his 12 week programme.  Commenting on his club, George said “‘The rowing out here is unbelievable…the standard of competition is awesome”.  Coaching at a school and rowing with a club provided George with an opportunity to appreciate a different approach to the sport.  “Australia has a reputation for producing really technical oarsman but I found the coaching was all about bladework and that was as far as it went; back in England when I’m on the water, training tends to be mainly technical but in Melbourne all my training was done on the water (I did one ergo session in six weeks) and those sessions were all about fitness.’

A rowing highlight for George was certainly his chance to race with his club in the Australian Nationals  held in Sydney, from which the U23 national team is selected: “It was pretty special paddling up and down the warm up lake in a double next to Drew Ginn and Duncan Free – they’re fast for a couple of old fellas. The after-party was pretty crazy too!”

Sport Lived strive to make the experience as easy as possible for their participants, setting them up with plush, modern apartments in South Yarra: an upmarket district in the heart of Melbourne. Warm, comfortable and relaxing decor provides the perfect space to relax after a tough day on the river; not to mention the fact that it is serviced regularly by cleaners. A massive perk is the addition of cable television and Internet provision, which mean you are always within touching distance of home.  George cycled the ten minutes to and from both his school and rowing club, preferring to enjoy the sunshine rather than use the excellent public transport services available.

George was looked after by Sport Lived mentor Matt Pell, who took him to work on the first couple of days and provided him with a mobile phone and a bank account, immediately upon arrival. In George’s words, ‘he basically made settling into a new city much easier. Both Matt and Charlotte, the mentor of the tennis coaches, do a great job of making us all feel at home.’ George lived in an apartment with three Sport Lived participants on cricket coaching programmes and, ‘despite coaching the most boring game ever we have a good laugh in our apartment and we don’t have to do housework which is a massive bonus.’

The boys truly enjoyed all that Melbourne had to offer, frequenting its casinos, bars and clubs, botanical gardens and nearby beaches. They even found time to tour the great ocean road in a campervan: life is hard for the gap year student with Sport Lived…

So how would he sum up his experiences? “All in all it was an amazing few weeks and I have found the Australian way of doing things very impressive and would thoroughly recommend coming out here to anyone who likes rowing.”