August 1, 2024 • 8 mins
We're finally at the business end of the Olympic sport that usually wins us all the medals - the rowing!
Rowing finals featuring kiwi athletes are coming thick and fast overnight.
Athens and Beijing gold medallist rower Georgie Earl (nee Evers-Swindell) spoke to D'Arcy Waldegrave on Sportstalk.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sports Talk podcast with Dancy Wildergrave
from News Talks.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
It'd be right now we're focusing on the rowing. Now
we're joined by Georgina Eviswindell. Now Georgie earl of course,
along with her sister, two gold medals back to back
four Anthens eight in Beijing in the double skulls, and
picked up three world championship titles too. She joins us now,
(00:31):
and I expect George looking at the rowing and looking
what's going on, got to ask do you miss it?
Speaker 3 (00:39):
I think I miss that feeling when you see them,
when you see the cross cross the finish line and
win or qualify for the next round of racing. It's
been it's been awesome to watch it. I mean we
were even up watching the quad racers last night, which
the finals, which were incredible, So yeah, I mean it
was I don't miss all the hard work that it
(00:59):
took to get to that position, but I'm.
Speaker 4 (01:02):
That feeling when you win is pretty incredible.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Of course, George. It's really interesting these two rowers because
they both have a silver medal, they both understand what
it means in the Olympic Games. Lucy comes from the
eight A brook comes from the double, so it's a
combination of two styles that's working quite well. How difficult
is that when it comes to transferring from different boats,
(01:26):
from different disciplines and different teams. Is that complex?
Speaker 4 (01:31):
I don't imagine for those girls.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
They've got a lot of experience in the sport now
and they would have done a lot of sweep and
sculling for obviously for New Zealand and also domestically at home.
They'll be obviously you can see that they're perfectly capable
from switching from one and they would have had plenty
of time to get the boat feeling good. So I'm sure,
as I said, I'm sure that they're because of how
(01:53):
talented they are, they will they make it look easy,
don't they?
Speaker 2 (01:57):
What easy? I couldn't even set up right and I
think it had fall over, no doubt about that on that.
So like that they're looking. God, they've been rowing particularly well.
What about the pressure on the shoulders of these athletes
coming in they've had success before, they know what it
takes to compete in the Olympic Games, and you've had
that situation backing up on gold, what's your head space like,
(02:19):
what's your mindset, like going into this, how do you
process this?
Speaker 3 (02:24):
Yeah, I mean, obviously from my experience, both our Olympic
regattas were so different, and Athens, Caroline and I went,
and I hate saying it, but I guess we were
the favorites after winning the two World champs leading up
to Athens. We went in his favorites and there was
a lot of pressure and it's really hard to cope
with that mentally, and I think Caroline I will both
(02:45):
tell you that we only just scraped through that week
in Athens.
Speaker 4 (02:47):
Mentally. We had a heats race.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
It's a bit different sort of schedule that they seem
to be racing this year in Paris, but we had
one heats race which we won, which took us straight
through to the final. And we were still really young,
we were twenty three or twenty four, and it was
a really long week mentally, with not much to do.
And I think back then we still thought that if
we didn't focus on the race, on our finals race
(03:10):
the whole time, even if we weren't at the lake practicing,
if we're back at the Hope that the house we
were staying, and then we would be letting ourselves down,
which nearly made us.
Speaker 4 (03:19):
I think our heads.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Explode with sort of the pressure, and as I said,
we only just made it through that week, and when
we did win in Athens, it was relief more than
happiness really, to be honest, and we probably didn't celebrate
that as much as we should have because it was
just a relief to have done what the expectation that
we had, that our coach had, and that maybe some
(03:40):
of the New Zealand public had. Whereas in Beijing we
had learned a few more skills and I think we
were able to switch on and off, and I think
that's what you need to be able to do to
handle those big regattas, which is exactly what the Olympics is.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
So this is experiential for you. You've gone through it Nathens,
so you know how to adjust with Beijing. What about
outside assistance a help because it's not just internal. What
else did you learn and from how did you get
to that stage?
Speaker 3 (04:09):
We had lots of support from New Zealand rowing, and
I think sports psychology is a big part of it,
and it's how you cope in the top two inches,
which is what it comes down to I think in sports.
Speaker 4 (04:21):
So we did a lot of work.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
Between between Athens and Beijing, and probably more so on
the psychology side of it than the you know.
Speaker 4 (04:30):
It was training hards easy. Training hard's easy.
Speaker 3 (04:33):
It's trying to get your heat around, and we loved
the training hard, but it's trying to get your heat
around those pressures is at that level is really tough.
And as I said, it probably took us the whole
eight years that we rode in the double to really
get on top of it, and we only were able
to do that at that last three gather in Beijing.
Speaker 4 (04:50):
So yeah, it's just all part of sport.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
I think interesting because you said you are wild favorites
in two thousand and four because you'd picked up back
to back World champ gongs. You've got another one straight
after the Olympics. Then there's a kind of a couple
Silver's bronze. You didn't really hit two thousand and eight
with too much pressure on you, did you.
Speaker 4 (05:13):
No, No, not at all.
Speaker 3 (05:14):
And particularly the last regatta in Europe before Beijing, we
had a shaka and we failed.
Speaker 4 (05:21):
It was a World cut regatta in Poland and we
failed to.
Speaker 3 (05:24):
Make the a final. We were beaten by crews that
we didn't even going to the Olympics. We pulled ourselves
together and raced the B final, which is, you know,
the top finals, the top six, so we're in the
B final.
Speaker 4 (05:34):
We won that.
Speaker 3 (05:35):
So we were ranked seventh at the last regatta before
the Beijing Olympic regatta, so we were at a pretty
low spot and it took a bit of work, probably
more so mentally than physically, to get our heads around
that and to even want to go up to Beijing
and compete. We didn't want to go there ranked well,
we didn't want to go there if that's all we
(05:56):
were good for.
Speaker 4 (05:57):
We only wanted to go if we thought we'd be competitive.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
So it took a lot of work than those sort
of last six weeks before the Olympics together head around
it and to get our boat moving fast again. Definitely
no pressure, absolutely no pressure leading up to no expectations,
expectations from ourselves that we wanted to prove to ourselves
that we were better than that regatta in Poland, So
a lot of a lot of high expectations from ourselves,
but definitely no pressure from the New Zealand public or
(06:21):
probably from our family.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Well, we've got Georgina we have huge expectation on our athletes,
on our Olympians, and especially on the rowers. It gets
heaked on because of the ridiculous, the outrageous success that
sport has had for New Zealand. So you won't be
able to answer this, and if you can, I love you.
But what is it about New Zealand and rowing? How
(06:44):
does it work so well for us?
Speaker 3 (06:46):
I think they've created this brilliant training Well that's what
I felt like when we were involved in the sport.
As I said, we've been out for a long time,
but I felt like when we rowed, the coaches were
in New Zealand, the CA Richard Tonks, the coaches and
then the athletes just created this really awesome training environment
(07:06):
at Carapiro and it was so competitive and every weekend
we'd be trying to beat each other on prognostic times
and it just got really competitive and.
Speaker 4 (07:17):
People learnt well.
Speaker 3 (07:18):
We learned that we had to train hard in order
to have success, and then we'd come back home again
and try and train even harder because we wanted that
feeling again of winning and that success.
Speaker 4 (07:27):
The following year.
Speaker 3 (07:28):
So I just I just remember when we were involved
in the sport. There was a brilliant team environment up
at Carapiro and it was super competitive, and after we'd
had a couple of years success, then some other team,
you know, members of the team and the squad started
having success too, And we always had these, you know,
to be able to come back from that failure in
(07:49):
Poland and train before Beijing. We got to come back
and train alongside and compare our times to Mahe Drysdale
and the single So we always had these amazing athletes
to race and train against, and for me, I think
that's what created the success of the crews when we
were in As I said, I haven't been up to
Carapier a long time, but they've done so well and
(08:11):
continue to do so well. And you can see how
much it means to them when you see them excited
with their results so far in their heats and quarters
or seems that Hoovers had semes and so it's awesome
to watch and I just think they're amazing and I'm.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
With you on that one. And Georgie earl Ne, Georgina Everswindle,
thanks so much for your time and for picking up
the phone. Enjoy the rest of the Olympics.
Speaker 4 (08:35):
Huh. Thank you.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
For more from sports Talk, listen live to news Talks
it'd be from seven pm weekdays, or follow the podcast
on iHeartRadio
You're listening to the Sports Talk podcast with Dancy Wildergrave
from News Talks.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
It'd be right now we're focusing on the rowing. Now
we're joined by Georgina Eviswindell. Now Georgie earl of course,
along with her sister, two gold medals back to back
four Anthens eight in Beijing in the double skulls, and
picked up three world championship titles too. She joins us now,
(00:31):
and I expect George looking at the rowing and looking
what's going on, got to ask do you miss it?
Speaker 3 (00:39):
I think I miss that feeling when you see them,
when you see the cross cross the finish line and
win or qualify for the next round of racing. It's
been it's been awesome to watch it. I mean we
were even up watching the quad racers last night, which
the finals, which were incredible, So yeah, I mean it
was I don't miss all the hard work that it
(00:59):
took to get to that position, but I'm.
Speaker 4 (01:02):
That feeling when you win is pretty incredible.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Of course, George. It's really interesting these two rowers because
they both have a silver medal, they both understand what
it means in the Olympic Games. Lucy comes from the
eight A brook comes from the double, so it's a
combination of two styles that's working quite well. How difficult
is that when it comes to transferring from different boats,
(01:26):
from different disciplines and different teams. Is that complex?
Speaker 4 (01:31):
I don't imagine for those girls.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
They've got a lot of experience in the sport now
and they would have done a lot of sweep and
sculling for obviously for New Zealand and also domestically at home.
They'll be obviously you can see that they're perfectly capable
from switching from one and they would have had plenty
of time to get the boat feeling good. So I'm sure,
as I said, I'm sure that they're because of how
(01:53):
talented they are, they will they make it look easy,
don't they?
Speaker 2 (01:57):
What easy? I couldn't even set up right and I
think it had fall over, no doubt about that on that.
So like that they're looking. God, they've been rowing particularly well.
What about the pressure on the shoulders of these athletes
coming in they've had success before, they know what it
takes to compete in the Olympic Games, and you've had
that situation backing up on gold, what's your head space like,
(02:19):
what's your mindset, like going into this, how do you
process this?
Speaker 3 (02:24):
Yeah, I mean, obviously from my experience, both our Olympic
regattas were so different, and Athens, Caroline and I went,
and I hate saying it, but I guess we were
the favorites after winning the two World champs leading up
to Athens. We went in his favorites and there was
a lot of pressure and it's really hard to cope
with that mentally, and I think Caroline I will both
(02:45):
tell you that we only just scraped through that week
in Athens.
Speaker 4 (02:47):
Mentally. We had a heats race.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
It's a bit different sort of schedule that they seem
to be racing this year in Paris, but we had
one heats race which we won, which took us straight
through to the final. And we were still really young,
we were twenty three or twenty four, and it was
a really long week mentally, with not much to do.
And I think back then we still thought that if
we didn't focus on the race, on our finals race
(03:10):
the whole time, even if we weren't at the lake practicing,
if we're back at the Hope that the house we
were staying, and then we would be letting ourselves down,
which nearly made us.
Speaker 4 (03:19):
I think our heads.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Explode with sort of the pressure, and as I said,
we only just made it through that week, and when
we did win in Athens, it was relief more than
happiness really, to be honest, and we probably didn't celebrate
that as much as we should have because it was
just a relief to have done what the expectation that
we had, that our coach had, and that maybe some
(03:40):
of the New Zealand public had. Whereas in Beijing we
had learned a few more skills and I think we
were able to switch on and off, and I think
that's what you need to be able to do to
handle those big regattas, which is exactly what the Olympics is.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
So this is experiential for you. You've gone through it Nathens,
so you know how to adjust with Beijing. What about
outside assistance a help because it's not just internal. What
else did you learn and from how did you get
to that stage?
Speaker 3 (04:09):
We had lots of support from New Zealand rowing, and
I think sports psychology is a big part of it,
and it's how you cope in the top two inches,
which is what it comes down to I think in sports.
Speaker 4 (04:21):
So we did a lot of work.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
Between between Athens and Beijing, and probably more so on
the psychology side of it than the you know.
Speaker 4 (04:30):
It was training hards easy. Training hard's easy.
Speaker 3 (04:33):
It's trying to get your heat around, and we loved
the training hard, but it's trying to get your heat
around those pressures is at that level is really tough.
And as I said, it probably took us the whole
eight years that we rode in the double to really
get on top of it, and we only were able
to do that at that last three gather in Beijing.
Speaker 4 (04:50):
So yeah, it's just all part of sport.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
I think interesting because you said you are wild favorites
in two thousand and four because you'd picked up back
to back World champ gongs. You've got another one straight
after the Olympics. Then there's a kind of a couple
Silver's bronze. You didn't really hit two thousand and eight
with too much pressure on you, did you.
Speaker 4 (05:13):
No, No, not at all.
Speaker 3 (05:14):
And particularly the last regatta in Europe before Beijing, we
had a shaka and we failed.
Speaker 4 (05:21):
It was a World cut regatta in Poland and we
failed to.
Speaker 3 (05:24):
Make the a final. We were beaten by crews that
we didn't even going to the Olympics. We pulled ourselves
together and raced the B final, which is, you know,
the top finals, the top six, so we're in the
B final.
Speaker 4 (05:34):
We won that.
Speaker 3 (05:35):
So we were ranked seventh at the last regatta before
the Beijing Olympic regatta, so we were at a pretty
low spot and it took a bit of work, probably
more so mentally than physically, to get our heads around
that and to even want to go up to Beijing
and compete. We didn't want to go there ranked well,
we didn't want to go there if that's all we
(05:56):
were good for.
Speaker 4 (05:57):
We only wanted to go if we thought we'd be competitive.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
So it took a lot of work than those sort
of last six weeks before the Olympics together head around
it and to get our boat moving fast again. Definitely
no pressure, absolutely no pressure leading up to no expectations,
expectations from ourselves that we wanted to prove to ourselves
that we were better than that regatta in Poland, So
a lot of a lot of high expectations from ourselves,
but definitely no pressure from the New Zealand public or
(06:21):
probably from our family.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Well, we've got Georgina we have huge expectation on our athletes,
on our Olympians, and especially on the rowers. It gets
heaked on because of the ridiculous, the outrageous success that
sport has had for New Zealand. So you won't be
able to answer this, and if you can, I love you.
But what is it about New Zealand and rowing? How
(06:44):
does it work so well for us?
Speaker 3 (06:46):
I think they've created this brilliant training Well that's what
I felt like when we were involved in the sport.
As I said, we've been out for a long time,
but I felt like when we rowed, the coaches were
in New Zealand, the CA Richard Tonks, the coaches and
then the athletes just created this really awesome training environment
(07:06):
at Carapiro and it was so competitive and every weekend
we'd be trying to beat each other on prognostic times
and it just got really competitive and.
Speaker 4 (07:17):
People learnt well.
Speaker 3 (07:18):
We learned that we had to train hard in order
to have success, and then we'd come back home again
and try and train even harder because we wanted that
feeling again of winning and that success.
Speaker 4 (07:27):
The following year.
Speaker 3 (07:28):
So I just I just remember when we were involved
in the sport. There was a brilliant team environment up
at Carapiro and it was super competitive, and after we'd
had a couple of years success, then some other team,
you know, members of the team and the squad started
having success too, And we always had these, you know,
to be able to come back from that failure in
(07:49):
Poland and train before Beijing. We got to come back
and train alongside and compare our times to Mahe Drysdale
and the single So we always had these amazing athletes
to race and train against, and for me, I think
that's what created the success of the crews when we
were in As I said, I haven't been up to
Carapier a long time, but they've done so well and
(08:11):
continue to do so well. And you can see how
much it means to them when you see them excited
with their results so far in their heats and quarters
or seems that Hoovers had semes and so it's awesome
to watch and I just think they're amazing and I'm.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
With you on that one. And Georgie earl Ne, Georgina Everswindle,
thanks so much for your time and for picking up
the phone. Enjoy the rest of the Olympics.
Speaker 4 (08:35):
Huh. Thank you.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
For more from sports Talk, listen live to news Talks
it'd be from seven pm weekdays, or follow the podcast
on iHeartRadio
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