Cash prizes: a good incentive for rowing events?

With the annual Gold Cup event coming up at the end of October, it is as good a time as any to discuss cash prizes in rowing.

For a little context, the Gold Cup is a highly prestigious single sculling event that has run since the 1920s in the US. It returned to regularity in 2011 and has one of, if not the, biggest prize pot in rowing:

• $10,000 will be awarded to the champion along with a gold cup trophy
• $5,000 for second place
• $2,500 for third place
• $1,000 for fourth

*these prizes do change slightly year on year.

Obviously with a prize like this, international talent is regularly attracted. The previous winners have all being from extremely high-performance backgrounds.

The funding for the prizes comes from a variety of sponsors and donors, generally large investment banks and holdings companies, but also rowing brands such as Hudson, Concept 2, and US Rowing.

The sponsorship goes not just toward the prize fund but also towards scholarships and educational programmes to give young people the opportunity to take part in rowing as well as give them a higher chance to earn scholarships to better college programmes.

There are numerous other examples of rowing events with large prizes including the Netz Cup in Germany and the Holland Beker in the Netherlands, each boasting their own prizes and attracting international talent year on year.

So the facilities are there for cash prizes in rowing with the three events listed above so why aren’t these events more popular, especially in the UK?

Experience as an athlete

Winning at the Henley Royal Regatta, an obviously well-funded and extremely prestigious event, was a little bittersweet.

The investment it takes to win some of the most competitive events in the country and the world is high considering entry fees to races increasing year on year, the cost of equipment including kit which can easily cost upwards of £100 a year, and simply feeding yourself the vast quantities to support your training program which is ever increasing with the cost of living. This doesn’t even touch on the huge time commitment needed, making consistent work very difficult to balance.

I was someone who struggled financially through this process and without support from scholarships, multiple part-time jobs, and help from parents, I simply wouldn’t have been able to make ends meet.

And, while the experience and feeling of winning is one that is priceless, a financial reward would certainly make the effort seem more worth it, even if it is just enough to buy yourself a victory dinner that evening.

Pros and cons of going pro

But is rowing ready to make the jump to a professional sport?

Most events in Britain are run by volunteers. By adding a prize pool to these events, they would be expected to also run more professional competitions.

Furthermore, the question of simply where the money comes from is important to note. For the most part, profits from events (if any) either go towards running next year’s event or funding the host club to support their athletes and equipment. There simply isn’t enough spare to go into prize funds.

Furthermore, by making rowing a professional sport, it is possible that the amateur side of rowing would lose funding. If the emphasis is put on the professional side – taking up events, sponsorship, and training centres – it would mean that most of the community could lose support, events, or even the ability to row completely.

Conclusion

I would propose that if a professional rowing league or series be set up, it should be done completely separately, creating new, exclusive events with partnerships and sponsors to be independent of the existing rowing calendar.

This would allow high-performance teams such as Leander, Oxbridge, and Brookes to enter more competitive events and could even lead to the formation of a new breed of teams drawn in by the prizes.

But it would also maintain the amateur side of rowing that most of the community is invested in.

You could argue that this could be seen as gatekeeping this side of the sport, but a natural progression system could be put in place through trialling for clubs, the same way one would get into the national team.

Moreover, further research would have to be conducted into presenting the sport in a favourable way in order to negate any negative stereotypes and give the sport as a whole a good image.

The concept of a professional side of the sport could also have the potential to gain interest from outside of the base community in the same way Wimbledon and the PGA Tour tend to for tennis and golf.

One could look to Rugby for an example of an amateur league going pro. In 1995, English rugby turned into a professional league, allowing athletes to accept payment for playing. This meant that professional leagues were separate from amateur, and the playing field was levelled. The professional status meant that clubs could be seen as companies, leading to bigger sponsors and financial support. It also meant that there were regulations to how clubs and events had to operate leading to higher quality and more openness.

The separation of high-performance and amateur clubs is already seen to an extent in many large rowing events such as Henley and HORR, where student-athletes cannot compete in club events. I would suggest making a new addition to this by including events for funded and non-funded clubs. This could help create a more competitive non-funded scene as well as a more competitive funded competition.

Of course, significant planning, interest, and work would have to go into this new genre, and it will likely take passionate volunteers and donors initially to get the system started but it could certainly be an interesting new direction for rowing in the future.

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