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Eric Murray: I definitely chose the wrong sport

Eric Murray won two Olympic gold medals with Hamish Bond in the men’s pair, with their combination regarded by many as the greatest in rowing history.

Murray also won nine world championship golds before hanging up his oars and now works in business development for ErgFit, is the patron of Autism NZ and when he’s not working or renovating ‘‘a lovely little place in Cambridge’’, he’ll be found on a golf course.

The 39-year-old is the ideal subject for our weekly

Back Chat feature on

New Zealand sporting personalities, where we grill them with the hard and not-so-hard questions.

Do you wish you’d become a professional golfer instead of an Olympic rower?

100 per cent. Mate, I love my golf. My dad would play and because we lived in Bombay, we’d go down to Maramarua. I was about 13, and must have been pretty bad – I can remember if you shot under 100 you’d be happy. I kept at it, played holiday programmes, but I started rowing and before you know it, you’re immersed in rowing. I’m never going to become a top golfer, but I have stuck at it and now I’m down into single digits, I’m a six [handicap]. I definitely did choose the wrong sport – if you’re in the sport for financial gains, rowing and swimming and a few others are more bottom of the list.

Did you feel during your career you were underpaid compared to All Blacks – or even more so, footballers, basketballers, tennis players – when you’re right at the top of your sport?

I never. . . it’s most other people that ask you these things. They say ‘you’re world champions, how much do you get paid?’ and we’d say ‘oh, we got 60 grand a year’ and they’re like ‘‘what?!’. Rowing doesn’t have leagues, it’s not on television, and that’s why you’re never going to get the money. At the Olympics, rowing’s pretty cool, but I don’t think you’d sit down every week to watch it.

Has it been hard to transition to life outside fulltime sport?

It’s been reasonably easy for me because I had a lot of good opportunities on the cards. I still feel I had an advantage by having a previous work experience too. It’s interesting now because a lot of sport has only been professional in the last 10-13 years and so only in the last five years or so have you seen people retiring from sports that have been fully funded by the Government. The Evers-Swindells probably only spent two or three years in the fully-funded model. You look at a world champion like Rob Waddell and it was the old Sports Foundation model and it was like 10 grand! You weren’t there for the cash, you were there for the glory – and that’s probably the way you look at a lot of

Olympic sports, you’re there for the glory.

How terrified were you at the Fight for Life against Manu Vatuvei?

That’s one of the few times I’ve experienced what I assume is fullon anxiety. It’s still a moment that sticks in my mind. I’m standing on one side of the ring, Manu on the other, everyone gets out of the ring, the lights go out and I was like ‘‘holy f..k, we’re on’. If someone had said I could jump out of the ring right now, I’d have probably done so. But, then you kick back into what rowing teaches you – you’re focused on what you’ve done in training. But there was a moment there was I was just packing myself.

Did you ever worry that you’d annoyed Hamish in training so much that he’d punch you?

Hand on heart, we never had a bust-up.

We never even really got into a heated argument, there was just no point.

And to be fair, nothing really went wrong anyway! Hamish doesn’t seem like the guy who would want to have a fight – he’s the type of guy who would love a debate.

‘‘I’m never going to become a top golfer, but I have stuck at it and now I’m down into single digits, I’m a six [handicap].’’

Adele or Taylor Swift? Probably Adele – she’s a banger.

And most importantly a month out; is Die Hard a Christmas movie?

Yeah, a hundred per cent.

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2021-11-21T08:00:00.0000000Z

2021-11-21T08:00:00.0000000Z

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