MATTHEW PINSENT

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'Sir Matthew Clive Pinsent' CBE (born 10 October, 1970) is an English rowing champion, four-time Olympic gold medallist and broadcaster.
Pinsent was born in Holt, Norfolk, and began rowing at Eton College. He began his international career at the Junior World Rowing Championships in 1987. He raced again in 1988, winning the junior coxless pairs with Tim Foster. After finishing school, Pinsent studied Geography at St Catherine's College, Oxford. He competed in three Boat Races, winning in 1990 and 1991 but unsuccessful in 1993 (when he was Boat Club President), having taken a year out in 1992 in order to concentrate on preparing for the Barcelona Olympics.
In 1990, while still at Oxford, he joined Steve Redgrave in the coxless pair at the World Rowing Championships – winning bronze. This was the beginning of a long partnership, and the pair won at the World Championships in 1991, and at the Olympic Games in 1992 and 1996.
In 2000 he won Olympic gold again as part of a coxless four with Redgrave, James Cracknell and Tim Foster. In August 2000, the month prior to winning gold in Sydney, he took part in a 3-part BBC documentary entitled Gold Fever. This followed the coxless four team in the years leading up to the Olympics, including video diaries recording the highs and lows in the quest for what would be Pinsent's third consecutive gold.
Pinsent and Cracknell then formed a men's coxless pair and won the coxless and coxed pairs (with Neil Chugani coxing) in the 2001 World Championships, and the coxless pair in 2002. However, after a disappointing 2003 season that saw Pinsent's first World Championships defeat since 1990, he and Cracknell moved to the men's coxless four for 2004.
At the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, Pinsent's fourth Olympic Games, Pinsent stroked the boat, with Cracknell, Ed Coode and Steve Williams. In a close race with world champions Canada, they again won gold.
Pinsent was elected to the International Olympic Committee's Athletics Commission in 2001, replacing Jan Zelezny. In 2004, at the Athens Olympics, Pinsent failed to secure re-election to the post, being replaced by Zelezny.
The 6ft 5 inch, 105 kg Pinsent had the largest lung capacitiy ever recorded in Britain, drawing in an astounding 8.5 litres of air with each breath, but has now been surpassed by fellow rower Peter Reed who has been measured at over nine litres.
Pinsent announced his retirement from rowing on 30 November, 2004, and was made a Knight Bachelor in the New Year's Honours list announced on 31 December 2004.
He ran the Flora London Marathon on the 23rd April 2006, in four hours and 8 minutes, finishing over an hour behind his rowing team mate James Cracknell.
Pinsent has recently begun making steps into broadcasting, as a sports bulletin presenter for BBC News 24.

Contents

Achievements

Olympic Games

World Championships

Junior World Championships

Bibliography

See also

External links

Achievements

★ Olympic Medals: 4 Gold

★ World Championship Medals: 10 Gold (all-time record), 2 Bronze

★ Thomas Keller Medal Outstanding International Rowing Career, Awarded by FISA

★ Junior World Championship Medals: 1 Gold

★ Blue Boat Appearances: 3 (2 wins)

Olympic Games

★ 2004 – Gold, Coxless Four (with James Cracknell, Steve Williams, Ed Coode)

★ 2000 – Gold, Coxless Four (with James Cracknell, Tim Foster, Steve Redgrave)

★ 1996 – Gold, Coxless Pair (with Steve Redgrave)

★ 1992 – Gold, Coxless Pair (with Steve Redgrave)

World Championships

★ 2003 – 4th, Coxless Pair (with James Cracknell)

★ 2002 – Gold, Coxless Pair (with James Cracknell)

★ 2001 – Gold, Coxless Pair (with James Cracknell)

★ 2001 – Gold, Coxed Pair (with James Cracknell, Neil Chugani)

★ 1999 – Gold, Coxless Four (with James Cracknell, Ed Coode, Steve Redgrave)

★ 1998 – Gold, Coxless Four (with James Cracknell, Tim Foster, Steve Redgrave)

★ 1997 – Gold, Coxless Four (with James Cracknell, Tim Foster, Steve Redgrave)

★ 1995 – Gold, Coxless Pair (with Steve Redgrave)

★ 1994 – Gold, Coxless Pair (with Steve Redgrave)

★ 1993 – Gold, Coxless Pair (with Steve Redgrave)

★ 1991 – Gold, Coxless Pair (with Steve Redgrave)

★ 1990 – Bronze, Coxless Pair (with Steve Redgrave)

★ 1989 – Bronze, Coxed Four (with Terry Dillon, Steve Turner, Gavin Stewart, Vaughn Thomas)

Junior World Championships

★ 1988 – Gold, Coxless Pair (with Tim Foster)

★ 1987 – 4th, Eight

Bibliography

★ ''A Lifetime in a Race'' (2004) ISBN 0-09-190149-9

See also

★ Leander Club (member)

External links

★ Official website

★ Profile on RowingOne

★ ARA biography