Queen’s Head Coach, Mark Fangen-Hall has accepted an offer from Mercantile Boat Club, Melbourne, Australia, to become their Head Coach.
This is a wonderful opportunity and a significant step up for Mark. Mercantile is one of Australia’s leading clubs and a feeder club for the Australian Rowing Team. While we are very sad to see Mark go, it is also a tremendous reflection on Queen’s and our current standing in the international rowing community.
Mark has given his heart and soul to Queen’s over the last 3 years. He has built on our proud history and brought new ways of thinking. With his team of volunteer coaches, he has enabled Queen’s rowing to achieve success at a range of levels in both the men’s and women’s clubs.
He has also turned down opportunities to move over the last couple of years, but who would turn down an opportunity such as this? He is very keen to maintain strong links with Queen’s and Belfast and we hope he will drop by when he visits the UK. We wish Mark, Victoria and Luc every success and happiness ‘down under’.
Mark’s departure occurs as we start a new cycle in Queen’s, with a lot of experienced rowers graduating last July. This is good timing for an incoming coach, and our attention now turns recruiting a top quality replacement. Mark has committed to working with us to ensure a smooth handover. That process has started and we will keep you updated in the October edition of our regular e-sheet. I met the Head of Queen’s Sport on Friday last, and she stressed the commitment of Queen’s Sport to the long term strategy for Queen’s Rowing. It is worth noting that the University has effectively tripled annual funding over the last 3 years – when virtually everywhere else is getting cuts (and this excludes the £50k for new boats last year).
For those donating to the Rowing Academy Fund which finances the lion’s share of the Head Coach salary, I would like to re-emphasise the sentiments of my email just before the Championships in July. This is a very long-term project. We are looking decades ahead and are still in the early stages. We want to create a system that is self-sustaining and makes success at all levels inevitable. We are still laying the foundations and critical to these foundations is the financial support through your donations and the efforts of the 35 (and growing) regular volunteers from LVBC.
The future of rowing at Queen’s lies not in the hands of one coach but in the volunteer alumni and the University. We will be around for years to come and we remain committed to the vision.
David Storrs
Captain
Lady Victoria Boat Club
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