Team GB pair Tom George and Ollie Wynne-Griffith in Olympic medal contention after joining forces at Cambridge University Boat Club

When he watches the Team GB crews take to the water at the Olympic Games in Paris over the next few days, Rob Baker is likely to be paying particularly close attention to the fate of Tom George and Ollie Wynne-Griffith.

The Cambridge University Boat Club men’s chief coach’s keen interest will come from the fact that it was he who first floated the idea of the duo joining forces during preparations for the 2022 Boat Race.

Prior to that, both George and Wynne-Griffith had been part of the British men’s eight squad that returned from the Tokyo Olympics with bronze medals around their necks.

Baker’s suggestion of switching to the men’s pair was certainly met with some scepticism, particularly from George.

But with Wynne-Griffith more open to the prospect, the school friends put their faith in Baker and have not looked back.

George said: “Rob needed one of us to swap sides for the Cambridge Blue boat, which was one of the motivations for asking us.

“But when he pulled us into his office, he explained his reasons for it in regards to the Blue boat, but he also showed us a lot of our data from telemetry systems and things like that.

“He had it mapped out and said he thought we’d make a good pair, but we’d only known him for six weeks at this point so he said that we would need to trust him on it. He knew it was a big leap of faith for us, but I’m so pleased we went with what he said.

“It’s cool that he spotted it, presented the data and was then able to say ‘come with me on this and let’s see where it goes’.

“We were a bit sceptical about the pair aspect, although we kind of knew that one of us should swap sides for the Boat Race.

“Ollie had been told over the previous couple of years by some physios that he had one leg slightly longer than the other and the way that his hips were positioned, he should consider bow side. And so he just grabbed the gauntlet and said he was happy to do it.

“I kicked the gravel a little bit and wasn’t sure. I thought swapping sides might be massively high risk and things like that.

“But when I realised how much Ollie was up for it, that solidified the trust in Rob.

“Ollie was willing to take it on so my thinking was ‘let’s try and do the pair as well then’.”

While it was Baker that helped to get the Peterhouse partnership off the ground, it has been Christian Felkel who has shaped George and Wynne-Griffith into genuine Olympic medal contenders.

Team GB rowing's technical efficiency specialist coach started working with the pair a few months ago and they have responded well to his methods – from a physical but also a mental perspective.

George, who will head to Paris unbeaten alongside Wynne-Griffith this season, added: “In our first year we had no real expectations. We’d win some races but we were a little bit inconsistent. In 2023 we were the form crew across the regattas but we kept losing by fine margins when it really mattered. We were over-egging things at certain points in the race and we didn’t have a clear strategy or plan.

“But we changed coach at the end of the year. We’ve been working with Christian and he’s really helped us to put a concrete plan in place. We 100 per cent trust in that plan and also in each other as well.

“He’s simplified everything down and that’s made us more successful. There’s a lot of comfort and calmness in that process.

“The results this year have been great. A big thing we’ve worked on this year is never having an expectation of the result, but having an expectation of performance.

“We want to put out our best race every time we go racing and ultimately if we can say ‘that was our best race but we didn’t win’, obviously we’d be gutted but we’ve done everything we can.

“It’s important for us that we can separate results from performance. So far that’s proven to be more than enough for us.”

The men’s pair heats will take place on Sunday (28 July), with the semi-finals set for Wednesday (31 July). The final is scheduled for two days later on Friday (2 August).