Rachel Brouwer and Hannah Van de Kemp

Dr. Byl

PED 201

30 March 2011

The Life and Times of Melanie Kok Canadian Medal Rower

Melanie Kok was born on November 4th, 1983 in Thunder Bay, Ontario and was raised in St. Catherine’s Ontario. After a successful start with rowing in high school, shereceived a scholarship with the University of Virgin in Charlottesville Virginia.

Melanie was not only successful in obtaining her BA in Psychology, but also thrived in the sport of rowing, winning many medals. After studying in at Virginia, she went to

McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, where she completed her Master of Science in Neuroscience. She is currently attending Western University in London, Ontario and hoping to receive her Doctor of Philosophy in Neuroscience.

Who to Watch This Spring (University of Virginia Magazine)

Melanie became a rower you could say by chance. Her best friend was a coxswain, someone in charge of the boats rowing, and asked Melanie if she wanted to join the rowing team. She loved the outdoors, and “found the water gorgeous and full of possibility.” So when given the chance to give it a try she decided to go for it. Melanie worked very hard at rowing and she had people from many Universities and Colleges knocking at her door, she eventually decided to go to Virginia over Princeton and many others. She showed that she was dedicated to her rowing by getting up for 5am

1 practice, making it through grueling weight lifting sessions, and sticking with it, even when it was hard or 5am came too soon.

Kok has experienced competitive races before but as she states in the article “

I’ve been to two World Championships, but the Olympics is just a different level, I don’t

think it will sink in for me until I get there” Kok is not only an athletic performer but she is also an All‐ACC academic performer, she made sure that her schooling came first. And she stated, “I’ve learned through rowing that I was stronger that I ever thought I was…

and that you can accomplish anything simply by working hard to reach a goal.

Toronto’s Beare among Medal Winners in Four‐Medal Day(GTA athletes)

Melanie has also won many medals before participating in the Olympics. She has also received third place in the world cup in women’s lightweight rowing in Lucerne,

Switzerland in 2008, first in 2008 in Poznan, Poland along with a few more medals. She has also been named athlete of the year in her home town, St. Catherine’s when she was twenty‐ four years old in 2005 when she was a member of the Ridley Graduate club.

Melanie works very hard at rowing and she had people from many Universities and Colleges knocking at her door, she eventually decided to go to Virginia over

Princeton and many others. She showed that she was dedicated to her rowing by getting up for 5am practice, and making it through intense weight lifting sessions.

Kok has experienced competitive races before but as she states in the article, “I’ve been to two World Championships, but the Olympics is just a different level, I don’t think it will sink in for me until I get there” Kok is not only an athletic performer but she is also

2 an All‐ACC academic performer, she made sure that her schooling came first. And she stated, “I’ve learned through rowing that I was stronger that I ever thought I was… and that you can accomplish anything simply by working hard to reach a goal.”

Rowers Win Bronze in Double Skulls(Ottawa Citizen)

Kok and Cameron both partook in summer Olympics 2008 in Beijing on the

Canadian lightweight double skull team. They were in second place half way through the race, right behind the Germans. Finland passed both the Canadian team and the

German team and resulted in winning silver medal while Netherlands won gold and Kok and Cameron received bronze; they won by 0.04 seconds. Kok and Cameron had a time of 6: 56.68 and Germans came through with 6:56.72. Talk about a fast race!

Watching What They Eat… (Torstar News Services)

Melanie Kok and Tracy Cameron have made sure that they are will be successful in Beijing by eating right and making good use of their trusty George Foreman grill. At first they were just crewmates but became fast friends. That relationship transferred into a medal winning career and friendship. They watch what they eat, and even when on the road andrefuseto eat out, often creating makeshift kitchens in the hotel room.

They bring their George Foreman, skillet and rice steamer are able to prepare for all the meals they need while away from the house.

Coming into the Beijing Olympics the two rowers were almost unknown and it as a chance to make a name for them, showing people what they were capable of while

3 keeping each other accountable through the journey. It was not all work for the two hardworking driven ladies and on weekends when they do not have to train they go on little getaways together, exploring Southern Ontario on little day trips. However, they make sure never to get side tracked away from their main goal, “Of course, we’re going

to gold. That’s everyone’s goal. I think you have to have that in mind. But we’re breaking down what we need to do to accomplish that. So it’s not just this, ‘Yeah we’re going for gold’ We bring it back to, ‘How are we going to get that goal medal?’.”

McMaster catches Olympic Fever (Daily News Article, McMaster University)

In the most recent Winter Olympics in Vancouver, Canada this past year, Melanie had the privilege of carrying the torch in Welland this past December. As a child Kok was a huge fan of the Olympics and she feels grateful not only be a part of the 2008 Summer

Olympics in Beijijng, but also tocarry the flamerepresenting Canada.

4 Melanie Kok’s Accomplishments

2002: Women’s British Henley 1st in the college 2003: Rowing Canada Female Sculler of the Year/ three Canadian Henley golds/ three Canada Cup golds 2004: Rowing Canada Female Sculler of the year/ Row Ontario Athlete of the Year/ four Canadian Henley golds. 2005: 2nd in NCAA team championships (U. of Virginia) 2005: 8th in women’s lightweight double, World Cup (Lucerne, Switzerland) 2007: 3rd in women’s lightweight single‐ World rowing Championships 2008: 3rd in women’s lightweight. 2x, World Cup (Lucerne, Switzerland) 2008: 1st in women’s lightweight. 2x, World Cup (Poznan, Poland) 2008: 3rd in women’s lightweight double ( Summer Olympics in Beijing)

5 Bibliography

Byers, Jim.“Toronto’s Beare among Medal Winners in Four‐Medal Day”. http://www.gtaathletes.com/2008/article/105909. (Viewed February 1)

CanWest News Service.“Rowers Win Bronze in Double Skulls”. Ottawa Citizen. http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=e5fc665e‐5da5‐ 44ef‐9a03‐f134cd171475 (Viewed February 1, 2011)

Miller, Jerry. “Who to Watch This Spring” University of Virginia Magazine. http://uvamagazine.org/sports/article/who_to_watch_this_spring/ (Viewed January 31, 2011)

Starkman, Randy. “Rowers Cameron and Kok are Fast Friends: Watching What They Eat inOrder to Make Weight.” Torstar News Services. http://www.gtaathletes.com/2008/article/104629(Viewed January 31, 2011)

No Author. “McMaster catches Olympic Fever.” Daily News Article, McMaster University. http://dailynews.mcmaster.ca/story.cfm?id=6526# (Viewed January 31, 2011)

6 Interview with Melanie Kok

Melanie Kok, who competed in lightweight women’s double skulls rowing in the

2008 Olympics in Beijing won a bronze medal with her partner Tracy Cameron.

1.)Who introduced her to the sport she was/is involved in?

Before Melanie got heavily involved in rowing she got involved through playing soccer first. One of her best friends from her soccer team was a coxswain (which is a rower who is in charge of the boat) from her high school’s only boat and she asked her to try it out. Rowing intrigued her and two people from the team just graduated so they were looking for two new people to fill the empty spots. So she thought she would try it out and ended up falling in love with the challenge of it, and has never looked back ever since. Melanie’s friend that had introduced her to rowing is still today her best friend and was also a member of the Canadian rowing team.

2.) How did she get involved?

Melanie got involved by joining her high school team and was fortunate enough to have both a great coach and great teammates. As a result, she had a great experience. When the high school season had finished, she joined a local club. She says she was lucky to have grown up in St. Catherine’s, which has a strong rowing history, and a number of successful clubs.

3.) What were here greatest highlight(s) of her sporting career?

Melanie’s greatest highlight(s) of her sporting career would be rowing at the

University of Virginia. Her teammates were and are amazing athletes; as well as amazing people and she had also had great coaches. She says she probably would not have

7 gotten to the Olympics if it were not from her collegiate rowing experience. It was an easy transition for her from rowing on her collegiate team to rowing with the national team, they trained so hard and it was always so competitive at school. Olympics in general were also a huge highlight for her. Seeing so many different people from so

many different sports and different countries and seeing all the world’s best athletes in

one place were an incredible experience for her. She loved the atmosphere of the games and she felt honoured to be a part of it.

4.) What were her highlight(s) in her Olympic experience?

Though Melanie loved to compete and race in the Olympics her greatest highlight in her Olympic experience was not necessarily about that. After she was done competing she would have dinner with her parents, who were staying outside of Beijing, on the other side of the city from the Olympic Village. A lot of roads around there were closed, and the restaurant they ate at was only a few blocks away, so she told her parents that instead of having their taxi go all the way around to the Village and then

back again, that she would walk back instead. She saw a large park on the map that she thought she could walk through, but it ended up being fenced and guarded, so she had to walk around the park, which was quite large. She probably had been walking for an

hour, and it started to rain, and she was somewhat lost. As she was trudging down the road, and old woman on a bicycle saw her, stops, and motions Melanie to get on her bike with her. Melanie refused to the little old lady for a few minutes, but the women

wereadamant,so she got on the bike and she parted to pedal. It was not much further to the Olympic Village, but the woman pedaled uphill in the rain to get me back to safety.

8 After Melanie got off the bike, she tried to think of a way to thank the old lady, but she had no money with her, and had nothing of any value.

Part of the gear that Melanie and other athletes had gotten was a little satchel/messenger bag that she had been using to carry everything I needed for the day.

She started to empty out her stuff onto the wet sidewalk, and the woman, with a horrified look on her face, started to pick it all back up for her. When she emptied out the last of her belongings, she tried to give her the bag to the woman. She refused to take it for about five minutes, but this time, Melanie was the insistent one. They did not speak the same language; they had to communicate through gestures the entire time.

The woman ended up taking the bag, and Melanie got safely back to the Village.

Melanie sometimes thinks about this woman on the other side of the world, and she hopes that the woman still has her bag, and thinks of her from time to time as well.

Melanie will always be grateful to the old woman in Beijing who was kind enough to stop and help a total stranger and expected nothing in return. “I think the Games truly do bring the world together, and this is my example of that.”

5.) What were her greatest achievements? Why?

One of Melanie’s achievements was winning a medal in the Olympics, but her

greatest achievement would be the process that it took her to get to that point. From the coaching she received; both in life and in rowing, to the friendships she’s forged, to the lessons she learned along the way, rowing has been an important part of her life.

The medal she received at the Olympics in rowing has been the culmination of all those years of training and all of that hard work. She says the actual trinketdid not mean much

9 to her‐ it sits on a shelf somewhere in my room, or in her sock drawer and she often does not even know where it is.

6.) Where there sport mentors/ heroes that inspired/ or assisted her? Who? How?

She had lots of sport mentors that had inspired and assisted her during her experience in rowing. A rower named Silken Laumann who won a bronze medal for

Canada in the women’s single, a rowing event in 1992, only ten weeks after her leg was shattered in an accident. She had to be carried down to the dock from her wheelchair in

order to row, and she still managed to win a medal. Melanie, Silken is a model of dedication and tenacity.

Her coach, Al Morrow at the Olympics, was also a mentor in her life. He not only taught her a lot about rowing fast, but he also taught her a lot about how to treat others, to face challenges with grace and courage, and how to be a better person.

Kevin Sauer, her coach at Virginia, taught her how to work hard and had always believed in her, probably more than any other person she could think of.

7.) What motivated her to reach or surpass her goals?

Her motivation to keep going and surpassing her goals was having supportive friends, family and teammates and coaches that had helped her stay on track and focussed. Melanie had high aspirations and the goal in and of itself was enough to keep

her going, to the point that quitting was not an option.

8.) Which major obstacles did she need to overcome? How did she overcome these

obstacles?

She has been fairly lucky as an athlete. She hasn’t had many serious injuries; an

10 she never really had to deal with failure or poor results. She has had stress fractures in her ribs a number of times, but each time, she was able to train though them. Her biggest challenge occurred on more a person level, where she had to deal with a coaching change during the Olympic year‐ eight months prior to the Olympics. A number of the other athletes in the program were dissatisfied with the coach, and the result was that the coach got demoted. They had to deal with developing a relationship with their new coach, as well as working on their relationship with their old coach, with whom they still had to interact with him from time to time. This was fairly challenging, as there were a lot of hurt feelings and emotions to take into account.

9.) Which major pressures did she need to deal with as an elite athlete? How did she deal

with these pressures?

Melanie explained that she had put more pressure on herself than any outside pressures could possibly impart, and so that all the other pressures would seem insignificant. She put pressure on herself to make the team, to race well, to make both

herself and others proud. She had an interesting strategy: She always imagined things as being harder than they actually were. It wasn’t intentional, but she frequently found that if she hyped something up to be difficult in her mind, that actually doing it was not as difficult as she imagined it to be.

10.) Did the following of government assist her in pursing her dreams?

The Ontario government has assisted Melanie in an indirect way. She knows that each province has a sport centre, and that it provides equipment and resources to

11 sports teams and the rowing team has been beneficiary of this service in the past. There are also bursaries that are available to apply for provincially, which Melanie has been a recipient for once. The government of Canada provides an athlete living and training payment, which enables athletes who participate in sports that do not have

endorsement of corporate sponsorship opportunities to support themselves. She received this allowance while she was in training, which she is extremely grateful for because she would have had to take out loans just for basic living expenses if this system were not in place.

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