James Vogel

James learnt to row at Durham University in 2015 where, not being originally strong or technical, he narrowly made it into the rowing squad in his first year.

He steadily improved each season and was selected for the U23 World Championship team in 2018 after proving his ability in sweep.

Despite having the ambition to achieve more in the sport, he felt like he had reached his ceiling. That was until Ali Brown, a coach at Leander Club, phoned James with an offer to join the club and showing that there was an opportunity to break through what he thought was his ceiling.

With a new found belief in himself, James joined Leander and learnt a lot in his 5 years there. He was then recruited into the GB squad after the Paris Olympics off the back of multiple World Cup performances. His rowing career so far has taught him a lot about himself, in particular that it is important to not set yourself ceilings and assume you can’t do something because it seems out of your reach.

Over the past few years as a full time athlete, James has worked with ActivKids UK, a charity that promotes a healthy lifestyle to children in schools across the country where he runs rowing related physical education sessions, activities, and assemblies. James enjoys working with ActivKids because he can inspire young people to pursue whatever it is they love or are passionate about and he can help them to not be affected by what others may think about their pursuits.Sharing the challenges and experiences of high-performance sport with young people has been one of the most rewarding parts of his sports career so far. He found confidence and self-belief hard things to develop at a young age so he hopes that his school visits with ActivKids have helped the students along that pathway even if it is just by a little bit!