wbsBoatClub.org

Visit of Lord Sebastian Coe to Oakley Court Hotel – Thursday 19^th February 2009

Rowers from the Boat Club recently had the opportunity to meet with running legend and Olympic gold medalist Lord Sebastian Coe when he visited the Oakley Court Hotel in Windsor.

The former multiple world record holder led the successful London bid to host the Summer Olympics in 2012 and is now the chair of the organising committee. He was on a tour of venues that will be staging events during London 2012 and was in Windsor to see for himself how preparations are going at Dorney Lake where the rowing and canoeing events will take place.

It had been planned for boys to demonstrate their rowing on the river but it was not possible due to the strong currents. Instead, Lord Coe chatted to the rowers about their sport and was particularly interested in the type of training they had to do to maintain their fitness and the kind of nutrition they had to take on-board. He also asked about the rowers’ own aspirations for competing in the Olympics in the future to which, Harry Gilmour replied, “I started rowing when I was about 12 and although I’ll be a bit young to think of the Olympics in London, maybe I’ll make it in Rio if that’s where the next one is held”.

Lord Coe later spent some time having his photograph taken with the gathered audience during which time our Club Chairman, Rob Gilmour, grabbed his chance and presented Lord Coe with a colour brochure describing the New Boat House project. He was clearly too busy to read it at the time but promised to do so later. We will await his declaration of support for the project with great hope!

Photos of the visit are here.