Women’s Boat Clubs Appoint New Chief Coaches

In a press release yesterday, it was announced that both Oxford and Cambridge Universities Women’s Boat Clubs have appointed new Chief Coaches. This move comes following the joint initiative between Newton and BNY Mellon, the Women’s and Men’s Boat Race sponsors, that will see the Newton Women’s Race move to the Tideway course in 2015, thus achieving parity with the Men’s Race.

Oxford University Women’s Boat Club have announced that Christine ‘Chris’ Wilson has been appointed Chief Coach. Chris,  a Canadian by origin,  has an extensive international coaching career spanning Olympic, University and School rowing. She was formerly assistant Coach to the US Women’s Olympic Team, Head Coach of Women’s Programmes at Yale and Cornell and was the first woman to coach men at a major American university programme. As well as this coaching experience, she recently worked as a Technical Adviser and Market Strategist for Concept2.

On her appointment Chris says, “I am grateful to the OUWBC for this unique coaching opportunity and for trusting me to lead the athletes through these exciting transitional years. The decision to create parity for the men and women who row for Oxford affords us the chance to build a modern racing tradition for ambitious university women. My appointment comes in the wake of exceptional performances by British Women’s crews at the London Olympics where the quality of competition reached new levels in all boat classes – role models abound for our squad.”

Cambridge University Women’s Boat Club have appointed Rob Baker as their new Chief Coach. Rob brings a combination of international and Tideway experience to the role, as CUWBC looks to transition to producing world class athletes competitive over the intense Tideway course in 2015. Rob has spent the last four years at Rowing Ireland where he has been working as Lead Under-23 National Coach. Before that, Rob was Assistant Coach at the Cambridge University Boat Club, where he coached the winning Goldie crews in 2006 and 2007, and acted as Head Coach in 2008.

Rob commented, “I am absolutely delighted that the CUWBC have asked me to be their new Chief Coach. It will be an honour and a privilege to lead the club into the first Newton Women’s Boat Race on the Tideway in 2015. I am very excited to be working alongside the CUBC on a level playing field and to help develop the CUWBC into one of the best University Boat Clubs in the world.”

The 2013 Newton Women’s Boat Race will take place on 24 March at Henley-on-Thames.