Dominic Casey listens to his athletes – that’s one of the secrets to his huge success

Former Irish international rower DENISE WALSH gives us an insight into Rowing Ireland’s lightweight coach Dominic Casey – the man with the Midas touch

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MAYBE he sees some of himself in me, or maybe it's because he knows how I work after all these years, but when Dominic Casey asked me to get more hands-on with coaching at Skibbereen Rowing Club, he probably knew I wouldn’t say no.

It’s not a secret that Dominic is a hard man to say no to, and he got the answer he wanted this time too, with my caveat that I needed more help.

This was around the time when I was starting to wind down my own rowing and was helping out more with the club anyway – Niamh Casey and myself were giving the juniors a hand – so it probably made sense to get more involved in the coaching side of things. It was a smooth transition.

Considering I learned most of what I know about rowing from Dominic, who was my coach both with the club and when I rowed for Ireland, he knows me better than most. And I’d feel I have a good grasp on him after all these years too; he knows I can say no to him too!

Even though he has been involved in rowing for well over 40 years – since before I was even born! – his appetite is still the same. He thinks about rowing non-stop, it’s 24-seven. Even the last few months as the preparations for the Olympic Games cranked up and he would be up the walls with the men’s and women’s lightweight crews at the National Rowing Centre, he would still call to the clubhouse in the evenings when he could, to keep up to date with what’s going on. Or turn to drive trailers up to the rowing centre for us if he’s heading back up there. On his days off – if they even exist – he’ll be over at the club.

That connection he has to Skibbereen Rowing Club is incredibly strong – we had the Irish Rowing Championships this month and even though he was in Banyoles in Spain on a pre-Olympic training camp, he was still in contact to see how the weekend was going. Who’s doing what? Who won that race? What can we do better? That’s always been the way. That won’t change, even if he is changing.

Dominic has definitely mellowed, which highlights his adaptability and evolution as a coach. I saw it myself when I was moving up from Skibb to international level; the Dominic that trained me as a junior in Skibbereen was different to the Dominic that trained me with Ireland.

Recently I asked him to chat to a group of girls in the club, to make them really understand what they need to do to progress and improve. I was expecting a rallying cry from him, like when we were younger he’d lay down the law of what we needed to do, or else. But he was a lot different this time, not as stern as he was before – he was too nice! 

‘Feck sake, Dominic, I wanted you to put the fear into them!’, I told him, and he laughed it off. But everyone has so much respect for him, given his work with Skibbereen and now with Rowing Ireland. He coached Paul and Gary to Ireland’s first-ever Olympic rowing medals in 2016 and then coached Paul and Fintan to Ireland’s first-ever Olympic rowing gold in Tokyo, and he has also been crowned World Rowing Coach of the Year (2018). Whenever he talks, people listen. But what makes Dominic such a good coach is that he listens to his athletes too.

He realises that every athlete is different, and he knows that different athletes respond to different approaches. Take Paul and Fintan (Irish men’s lightweight double) for example, they like to train a little bit later in the day so Dominic will train a bit later, but if Aoife and Mags (Irish women’s lightweight double) want to train earlier, then he will go earlier with them. He will find a compromise and make sure that everyone feels they are having an input in training and that’s important – if you are invested in it and feel that you are having a say, you’ll get more out of the athletes because you have that buy-in from them.

SILVER BULLET: Denise Walsh celebrates winning silver in the women's lightweight single at 2017 World Rowing Cup I.

I think back to 2017, my best year for Ireland when I won silver medals in the lightweight women’s single scull at the European Rowing Championships and at World Cup I, and a final at the World Rowing Championships. I was coming off the back of missing out on the Olympics in 2016 and I needed a change of scenery, so I wanted to base myself at home in Skibbereen Rowing Club instead of the National Rowing Centre. I talked to Dominic about this. He had started as a high-performance coach with Rowing Ireland, and understood that I'd be a lot happier based in Skibb. Different athletes need different conditions. 

He knew what was best for me, that I have this connection with Skibbereen and that training at home was what I needed at that moment. Dominic is flexible in his approach, and he saw I was a lot happier in Skibb. I was more relaxed, enjoyed it more and I rowed better – and that showed in my results. 

He lets the athletes think for themselves, to feel that their input matters, and that’s very important. That’s one of the changes I have seen with him over the years – maybe before it was a broad, one-cap-fits-all approach, but now he focuses on rowers as individuals and thinks differently depending on who he is coaching. He has refined his approach, but is still getting the results. That’s rubbed off on me too, and when different situations pop up I find myself sometimes thinking ‘what did Dominic do?’ It’s great to be able to draw on that experience. I’m not saying we agreed all the time – and one of his approaches with me was to let me rant when he knew I had to! – but it’s great to have Dominic as a sounding board because he has all that knowledge and experience. 

Everyone involved in the club has the best interests of Skibb rowing at the centre of every decision made. Will this be good for the club? Will this make us better? If that sounds familiar, it’s because that’s how Dominic has always been. It’s probably why he knew I wouldn’t say no when he asked me to help out with coaching; his approach has, to a certain extent, shaped me as a coach, and that would be the same for a lot in the club. It’s probably why I wasn’t happy with only four titles at the recent national championships too – now I’m starting to sound like Dominic!