18 | BOOMAL ACK A
GOLDEN D E T E R M I N AT I O N Lucy Stephan
LUCY STEPHAN WAS PART OF THE AUSTRALIAN GOLD MEDAL-WINNING WOMENS' COXLESS FOUR IN THE TOKYO OLYMPICS. WE HAD A CHAT WITH LUCY ABOUT LEARNING TO ROW AT GRAMMAR, AND LIFE SINCE THEN. Congratulations on your Gold Medal, Lucy! Could you talk us through how you came to rowing and what you love about the sport? Oddly enough, I found rowing on a Year 6 camp to Canberra with my primary school in Nhill. We went to the Australian Institute of Sport and had a tour. As part of the tour, we went to a room that was like an interactive experience. You could race Cathy Freeman, try to jump a certain distance and one of the activities was two rowing machines connected to a TV screen and you raced each other. I thought it was cool that the harder you pulled the faster you went. There didn’t seem to be a whole lot of skill involved, it was more about your mental toughness to keep going. When I began boarding at Grammar it was my first opportunity to actually give the sport a go. I fell in love with it pretty instantly. It gave me a place where I belonged. It also was a
sport that was pretty black and white. You made the crew if you made the boat go fast. Coaches’ discretion didn’t really play into it. I always say it’s the ultimate individual sport but also the ultimate team sport. You have to make sure you are at your absolute best. It’s not like netball where if someone is having an off day you don’t throw them the ball or you put them on the bench. You are literally carrying yourself and each other down the course. I think there is something so special about that. Who are some of the people at Grammar who helped you along the way? I think to start would be to go back to my very first coach, Kat Bateman, and my crew. They made it fun. They showed me what rowing could be. Then probably who really shaped me as an athlete would be Bill Gribble (OG 1971 and long serving Grammar Rowing Coach (1998 to 2019) had so much passion for coaching and I thrived on that. And the girls I was in the First Crew with: Paige Mackay (2010), Sarah Armstrong (2009), Annie Armstrong (2011) and Alana Heinz (2010). We were a unit that set the goal of winning Head of the Lake, and we did! For me that was the first time I had a set a
goal for myself. It was something that I truly wanted. The three Directors of Rowing during my time at Grammar and beyond: Denzo (Bradd Denham, OG 1996, Director of Rowing 2006/07 to 2010), Luke Pougnault (Current staff member and Director of Rowing 2011 to 2015) and Sam Pullin (OG 1996, Director of Rowing 2015 to current), all helped me in any way they could, even though Luke and Sam weren’t at the School when I was there.
