Sally Barbrook ready to take on the British Rowing Indoor Championships after just 12 months of rowing

Fergus Mainland was in conversation with Sally Barbook who will race the British Rowing Indoor Championships after discovering the sport for the first time via HYROX

The British Rowing Indoor Championships is just one of several high-octane events that are taking place at the NEC in Birmingham. The weekend brings together thousands of fitness enthusiasts all wanting to push their body to the limit and put their training blocks to the test against athletes from across the UK and around the world.

ATHX, one of the most popular CrossFit competitions, will be taking place alongside BRIC once again this year. It certainly isn’t uncommon for some of those competitors to venture to the BRIC arena and catch a glimpse at the sort of scores that can be produced when targeting just rowing as opposed to having to combine various disciplines of functional fitness.

Ahead of BRIC 2025, Sally Barbrook has been on a similar journey of discovery with rowing. 18 months ago, she set herself the challenge of completing a HYROX competition. A chance encounter in a gym means she finds herself two weeks away from racing in her first indoor rowing competition.

“I was seeing some pretty decent times in the gym,” said Sally.

“I didn’t really know what good looked like if I’m being completely honest, and it was only when I was sitting on the erg doing a 5km, and a guy came over and sat down next to me who does marathon rowing.

“He used me to pace and stopped me afterwards and had a bit of a chat and said to me that I was holding a decent pace and he was using me to pace. It hadn’t really occurred to me, and I thought this was something I’m good at!

“It’s been a baptism of fire trying to work out what I should be doing and trying to implement that into my training. I’ve had moments of sheer despair when I sit on the rower and think, ‘I can’t do it, I just don’t want to pick the handle up,’ all the way through to, ‘I’ve got this nailed, I’m flying along, this is great!”

Sally’s fitness journey is a recent one. Working from home had started to take its toll, and in her own words, she decided to grab the bull by the horns and see what she could achieve.

The British Rowing Indoor Championships will be her first-ever indoor rowing competition, and she’s diving headfirst into it. Sally will race the 2000m and 500m events on Saturday, and the thought of being on the same floor as the GB Rowing team is a tantalising prospect.

“I googled a bit around rowing events and what was going on. It actually came up in a Facebook feed because, of course, it listens to absolutely everything, doesn’t it! I looked at it and saw what was happening last year in terms of the times that people were achieving, and also that it’s not a million miles away. I thought, ‘It’s 2000m, it’s 500, what’s the first that could happen?’ Buy the ticket, off we’ll go!

“For me, it’s something completely different. Getting in amongst proper athletes doing things most normal people don’t do and seeing how they get on. I’m looking forward to rubbing shoulders with them, I guess. It’s quite aspirational and inspirational to see properly dedicated athletes doing something that I never thought would be remotely feasible for me.

“I’m really excited to get involved, and I’m really looking forward to seeing the GB Rowing Team there as well, that’s very exciting indeed. It’ll be interesting to see how much shorter I am than everybody else down there, and it will be quite nice to talk to some people about their training plans, about what they do, and what works for them.

“How do they keep themselves fuelled? What do they do in advance of competition? Competing is extremely new to me and it will be my first one out of the blocks doing anything remotely serious since the egg and spoon race when I was about five!”

Sally is 5ft3 but has taken no prisoners so far on the indoor rowing journey. During one particular session, Sally’s Personal Trainer set her a goal of going a certain number of metres in 10 minutes. All this training has awoken a bit of a monster in her, and she set out with purpose to smash the target set by her PT.

Sally went 70m further than the challenge, but what she only found out afterwards was that this was her PT’s PB, and he was 15 years younger and quite a bit taller than her.

The two of them are captivated by all the improvements that can be made in such a short period of time. The two of them have been on a voyage of discovery, figuring things out like drag factor, why it affects your rowing and trying to find what form and technique looks like.

“I’m still working on that last bit, I haven’t nailed that yet,” said Sally with a laugh.

While Sally has two half marathons and another couple of Deadly Dozen events to look forward to in 2026, BRIC has been the ultimate focus for her training.

“I think it’s all good exposure. I don’t necessarily know where the rowing journey will take me, and I think that’s why I’m dipping my toe in the water just to see how I get on and to see how much I enjoy it. It’s about finding the right fit for me, as, dare I say it, an athlete.

“I’m looking forward to getting involved with something I really enjoy. I’ve never sat in a proper rowing boat, so maybe that’s the next thing, who knows!”

Join Sally at the British Rowing Indoor Championships, which will take place 6-7 December 2025 at the NEC in Birmingham.