World Rowing Forum opens in Istanbul

Coaches, administrators and FISA officials from around the world gathered today for the start of the second World Rowing Forum in Istanbul, Turkey.

Opening the Forum, FISA President Denis Oswald reiterated the theme of three days; competing for the future ? attracting new generations to rowing. ?We need to address where we stand and where we go to go forward,? said Oswald. ?We have to be able to compete with other sports.?

Keynote speaker, Sir Philip Craven comes at sport from a Paralympic point of view. As President of the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) Sir Philip has been part of major developments in the organisation over the last three years.

?Our vision for the IPC is to enable paralympic athletes to achieve sporting excellence and inspire and excite the world.? The IPC includes 24 sports with rowing becoming one of the Paralympic sports earlier this year.

Second keynote speaker, Wayne Goldsmith challenged the rowing community to look in the mirror and face change. ?In sport success is a moving target. The old way is not the only way,? Goldsmith told the Audience. Goldsmith fronts his own coaching and training company, Moregold Sports Ltd in Australia.

?Kids are different now. They want instant gratification; they want it all and they want it now and it must be fun. It’s getting harder to sell Olympic sport to kids.? Goldsmith sees professional sport as the main threat to the ability of rowing to attract and maintain athletes. Why choose rowing over football?? added Goldsmith who sees rowing as up against incredible competition. ?Because our talent pool is so small, it happens quite often that every child who comes into rowing, we look at like an Olympic
Champion. So we put high training loads on them.? The reality is that 99% of the athletes that come into our sport won’t be Olympic athletes.?

The World Rowing Forum will continue until 5 November with 25 speakers contributing including “Ask the Coach” time with United States head men’s coach, Mike Teti.

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