Rowing and Sport Participation Biography

Participating in sport has always been a significant part of my life.  At school and university, I took part in a combination of rugby, football, cricket and athletics.

In my twenties, athletics became more of my focus as I became involved in long distance running.  I competed as a club standard runner, predominantly in road racing (10mile (PB 58.33), 5 mile (PB 29.07) and 10k races and 10k (PB34.52), running for a club in London, Herne Hill Harriers.  I dabbled at cross-country and some track events.  I also played a lot of squash.

In my early thirties I developed what I thought was a persistent groin strain that began to limit my running and squash.  In 1992, aged 34 years, this pain was eventually diagnosed as early onset osteo arthritis in my left hip.

That appeared to be it for my competitive sporting career, with the prospect of pain management and waiting until old age before hip replacement surgery became an option.  I tried to keep in shape by swimming, which I found a bit of drudgery but was very useful in terms of weight management.

In 1998, I was referred to an orthopaedic consultant who specialised in surface hip replacement surgery for younger patients and I had a successful operation in the spring of that year.  In the summer, I was given the green light to begin exercising again, and with great delight threw those swimming goggles away and took up non-impact CV work and resistance work in the gym.  I followed or devised my own programmes using stationary bikes, cross trainers, step machines, indoor rowing machines, free weights and weight machines, using knowledge gained from my running history and advice from gym staff.

Training becomes more focussed...