Rowing has often been seen as an elitist sport. But at Bewdley Rowing Club we know that's not the case. We see people come in, have a go and just few months later compete in their first regatta.
So we're joining in with London 2012 Open Weekend this year to help open up the sport, make it more accessible. Over the weekend we'll have hundreds of crews from around the country competing at one of the largest inland open regattas in the country. And we’re inviting everyone in the area to come and watch, see the sport live and think about giving it a go.
Today I was in Trafalgar Square with representatives from around the UK who are also taking part (they ranged from circus performers to disability dance). I was there with Steve, who came to us 18 months ago having never rowed before. He's now got his sights on competing in 2012 and has every chance of making it. From a short, skinny kid to where he is now, he’s our way of showing everyone’s got potential.
It's great to be a part of the run up to the Olympics. It's really important for our small town and having over a thousand people come along to something like the regatta will also help create a groundswell of support for the Games.
I know I'll be taking a couple of weeks off in 2012 to get down to see some action – how often do you get a world-stage of sport on your doorstep?
Rowing is now such a high profile sport I wonder if it couldn't be used as a hook to get people exercising more in the run up to the games. One idea I had was that you could set up reality TV show around a group of rowers leading up to the olympics. What if there was an open call for rowers, but lets say you specified - had to be over 6ft 4 tall and 16 stone so you get a lot of big people turning up (this specification may not be neccessary?), you then select 40-50 say and run 4-5 teams of eights against each other. The objective would be to get one or more of these teams up to international standard (possibly olympic standard) by 2012. You would have three seasons of reality TV, great publicity for the olympics, and it would demonstrate how ordinary people could do extraordinary things!The key thing would be that none of those selected would be athletes before hand, and some may even be overweight or very unfit. The program would demonstrate the transformational effect of exercise and would be great viewing.