Bell ringers: Australian Women’s Four ready for ding-dong battle at World Championships

By Rupert Guinness with the Australian Rowing Team in Europe

Every now and then during a heavy training block, one of the Australian women’s rowing team members will reach for a bell that hangs on the wall of their gym and ring it loudly.

The act is not to signal the end of another brutal session. Rather, it is to stop, pause and take time to celebrate a small but important stepping stone leading towards the collective big picture goal.

That big goals await at the World Rowing Championships in Belgrade, Serbia, from September 3-10 where the Australian team will also be racing to qualify boats for the 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games in Paris.

‘Ringing the bell’ is as a way to recognise an achievement by a crewmate or squad member during that long journey towards a World Championships and Olympic or Paralympic Games. The achievement must be a ‘personal best’ on the water, or during a weight or rowing ergometer session. But they are moments that can so easily slip by unnoticed in a season given the intensity of training.

Of course, the right for a member of Australian women’s rowing team to ring the bell must be given approval, and by the person who introduced it last year: Tom Westgarth, coach of the Australian Women’s Four and Quad Scull crews.

“It is to celebrate each successe and achievement,” Westgarth said this week at the Australian Institute of Sport European Training Centre at Gavirate in northern Italy where the Australian team is based for its final preparations for the World Championships.

“If we set our sights on our processes and on-water performances you know nothing is going to stand in the way of putting out our best performances.

“It keeps the training purposeful. You know you are not just completing the training, but completing it with purpose. You know there’s a chance to compete with yourself this week. You know that on this session, then the next and the next, that how you keep getting better is by continuing to challenge yourself … session to session, week to week.”

Giorgia Patten, a new member this year of the Women’s Four boat in which Australia won Gold at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, believes ‘ringing the bell’ not only recognises individual milestones, but also tightens spirit in the squad.

A member of the Australian Eight that placed fifth in Tokyo and in last year’s World Championships at Racice in the Czech Republic, Patten believes the bell has also helped mould the new-look Women’s Four.

In the 2023 Four with Patten are Lucy Stephan OAM, who was in the 2021 Olympic champion crew, Sarah Hawe and Katrina Werry. Stephen and Werry also crewed in the Four that won a bronze medal at last year’s world championships

“Everyone is training so hard day after day, just head down, trying to get those small gains,” Patten said this week. “We’re all striving to just become better athletes individually to contribute to a better crew. Sometimes you can lose sight of those little wins, especially for each other. The bell is a really simple but really powerful reminder that we’re all pushing each other to become the best athletes we can be.

“It’s really important that we celebrate when each other gets those little personal achievements. When you’re in the hole, and really grinding and training week after week, sometimes it’s hard to stay really excited about that end goal because it can seem quite far down. Just to have the celebration of the girls around you and the coaches clapping when you get that little ‘PB’, it’s been massive. It just lights the fire a little bit.”

Patten is excited about the world title prospects of the Four. They won a Silver Medal behind Romania and ahead of third- placed Great Britain in their last regatta, World Cup III at Lucerne, Switzerland in early July. In June they won Bronze in World Cup II at Varese in Italy behind the winners, the United States, and second-placed Great Britain.

“There is a lot of depth in the event this year,” Patten said. “There’s been some really impressive performances from a lot of different nations. We’re right up there in the mix.

“This year, everyone’s going to have to show up at the World Championships and put their absolute best race together.

“I’m predicting it’s going to be a really close finish. There’s no clear crew. We’re all chasing. It’s anyone’s game.”

• The World Rowing Championships will be broadcast on Kayo/Foxtel in Australia from September 3-10. Rowing Australia will provide full coverage from Belgrade and across all of our social media channels.

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