Alex Gregory

With two Olympic Gold medals and five World Championship titles to his name, Alex Gregory MBE is one of the leading rowers in the world. Further to this, Alex was a member of a World first arctic rowing expedition where he and an international crew of athletes undertook a new challenge—to row across the Arctic Ocean.

Alex is an endurance athlete and motivational speaker who expertly addresses pushing oneself to the brink of human potential, reaching for audacious goals, and digging deep to find inner determination at all costs. Alex knows a thing or two about resolve; his Olympic success did not come easily. After a decade of failures and disasters, Alex was taken to the very edge of his belief, before making his way through to the other side and emerging as a world-class athlete and global champion.

It was whilst sitting on the sidelines as spare man for the Beijing Olympics in 2008, that everything changed for Alex. He was beaten, ready to leave the sport unfulfilled, unsatisfied, and broken. In his speeches, Alex describes a ‘lightbulb’ moments when several simple realisations fell into place. A new motivation, desire, and will to do what he believed he could was at that moment firmly embedded in his mind. Just twelve months later, Alex led the world to win his first of five World championship titles. In that short time, everything had changed, and confidence, consistency, and peak performance became his new norm. On August 4th 2012, on the waters of Eton Dorney, Alex and his crew forged their way to Olympic Gold on a momentous day that has gone down in history as ‘Super Saturday.’

As the only remaining member in the renowned Great British Coxless four, Alex was under enormous pressure to lead the boat to victory and ensure this incredible winning tradition continued in Rio. Drawing on all the lessons and experience he gathered over the years, Alex and his crew took GB’s fifth consecutive Olympic gold in the coxless four on the Rodrigo de Freitas lagoon right in the heart of the city. Despite the expectation and pressure to perform and win on the greatest sporting stage in the world, Alex did it for the second time in his career in what he describes as his “perfect race.”

Alex takes his audience on an emotional journey through the highs and lows of top level Olympic sport. His relaxed attitude and emotive words allows the audience to live the journey with him while developing the qualities and skill set of a double Olympic champion. Working as a member of a team to create a machine greater than the sum of its parts has been key to Alex’s continued success. In a sport where one must completely rely on and equally importantly motivate those around you, Alex is well versed in bringing a team together towards a common goal under the highest of pressure.

In 2013, Gregory was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire for services to rowing. In 2015, he was named “Olympic Athlete of the Year” at the GB Rowing Teams awards.

Alex spent a month exploring some of the coldest waters in the world while on a pioneering Arctic rowing expedition in 2017. With the desire to push his boundaries and test his mental capacity in a vastly different environment to what he was used to, Alex learnt far more about himself, team dynamics and leadership than he ever expected. An extraordinary journey discovering little seen natural wonders, exploring a rarely visited part of the globe, battling dangerous seas, immensely cold conditions eventually finishing the journey on a little known volcanic Island, Jan Mayen. The expedition was a resounding success for Alex, filled with lessons and experiences that will enthral audiences in all walks of life.

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