IT’S THE THE aftermath of the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, and all the rowers have come together for a gathering.
The races are behind them. This is a chance to decompress from the intense competition, park the rivalries, and meet the human behind the opponent. The drinks are flowing in the Olympic Village as a festival atmosphere takes over to wash away the pressures they came to Tokyo with.
Among the crowd are Ireland’s Mags Cremen and Aoife Casey. Olympic debutants at just 21, they narrowly missed out on a place in the women’s lightweight double sculls ‘A’ final and came second in the ‘B’ final. There’s more to come from them in this sport.
The day eventually brings them into the orbit of the other women who row in the lightweight category. Everyone is enjoying each other’s company as the conversation shifts to sport, and the demands of the lightweight rower. They lead very different lives compared to their heavyweight colleagues.
The weight cuts. The 57kg weight requirement. The sweating down to make that number. The cycling with heavy clothes on. The rib injuries in the winter when bones don’t have enough protection. The difficulty of trying to manage it all and the feeling of being the only one who struggles with striking the balance.
But they’re all discovering something now: they’re not alone. Everyone can relate to each other’s difficulties. Everyone admits to moments where they feel like they can’t cope.
“It’s kind of sad, to be honest, that everyone did struggle,” Cremen tells The 42 in a Cork city café, not far from her home in Rochestown. “But it was really nice to be able to talk about it.”
Mags Cremen [right] in the boat with Aoife Casey at the Paris Olympics. Morgan Treacy / INPHO
Morgan Treacy / INPHO / INPHO
****
It’s late September 2025. RTÉ have just flagged down the gold medal winners of the mixed Double Sculls at the World Rowing Championships in China. Smiles are stretched across the faces of Fintan McCarthy and Mags Cremen.
McCarthy, a double Olympic gold medallist, is telling the broadcaster how the pair would normally be racing against each other at training, and how it’s nice to be rowing with each other for once. They’re close friends from their time in the lightweight programme, and are newcomers to heavyweight rowing.
The mixed Double Sculls is not an Olympic event, but that could change in future cycles. At the end of the interview, Cremen notes the size of some of the male rowers they came up against in the final.
“And beating them,” McCarthy adds while talking to the camera. “They’re probably about double your size.”
2025 has ushered in an era of change for Cremen. She finished her undergrad degree in UCC, and is now starting into a Masters in Applied Sports and Exercise Psychology.
Life is different in the boat too. That move up to the heavyweight ranks came after the Paris Olympics which marked the end of lightweight rowing. Zoe Hyde is her partner these days. They’ve competed together at all the regattas this year including the recent World Rowing Championships. They won the ‘B’ final of the Women’s Double in a time of 7:00.20.
Cremen’s old Skibbereen comrade Aoife Casey has also switched to heavyweight rowing, but was paired with Emily Hegarty at the World Championships. Cremen and Casey were a double act for seven years, effectively growing up in the water together.
After failing to make the ‘A’ final of the lightweight double sculls in Tokyo, they surpassed that step in Paris last year when they finished fifth in the world. They still remain close friends, but Cremen has enjoyed the process of sharing the oars with other rowers.
“It is great to spread your wings and row with different people. And who knows, we might be rowing together in some sort of boat at some stage in the future? I think we’ll always look out for each other massively.”
Cremen did briefly contemplate stepping away from rowing after the Paris Olympics. The conclusion of the lightweight programme prompted her to think that perhaps everything was coming to a natural end. The option to attempt heavyweight rowing was there for her, but the urge to pursue it didn’t come instantly.
She was 25 at the time and looking at how her world was changing around her.
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Cremen and Zoe Hyde after finishing fourth in the final of the Detlev Seyb / INPHO
Detlev Seyb / INPHO / INPHO
“All my friends had moved on with their lives,” she says as the world moves around us in The Three Fools café in Douglas Court Shopping Centre. People shuffling in and shuffling out with their orders. Some take a seat, but most are on the move. The first table we pick is in front of a window, where the watery autumnal sun strains Cremen’s sight.
After moving into a more shaded area, we can hear a barista periodically slamming some instrument of the coffee machine in the back. A noisy, but necessary step of their job which makes this writer fret that Cremen’s voice will be drowned out in the recording.
But here, in the calm amidst the chaos, her words rise above the din.
“You’re not really moving with the status quo,” Cremen continues. “You feel that pressure 100% because you’re kind of living the same life that you’ve lived since you were 18.
“But after a short time just thinking about it, I was like, ‘This is an opportunity I can’t give up.’ What if there is a future for me in heavyweight? I suppose just missing the people and missing the sport after a couple of months. I think it’s where I’m at my happiest.”
****
When a young Mags Cremen looked at Olympic athletes on the television, she didn’t believe it could happen for her. They didn’t seem human in her eyes. From another planet. This was their birthright, not hers.
It was hockey for most of her days growing up in Rochestown, attending St Angela’s secondary school. She loved it because that was the sport all of her friends played and the discos on Saturday nights after training were part of the fun. But it was difficult for her to really evolve as a player. With so many girls all fighting for position, game time was hard to come by.
Her best friend was involved in rowing, and her parents encouraged her to follow.
“I joined rowing in 2013, going into 2014 but I was allergic. I was like, ‘No way am I going down there.’ My Mum was best friends with my best friend’s Mum and she wanted to be part of the ‘Rowing Mums.’ They just wanted me to try something new and something that might be good for me.”
But then she took the cool aid. And it took her immediately. She quickly found herself daydreaming about rowing, wishing away the hours at school so she could get to rowing training. What she was missing in hockey was adequately provided for in rowing.
“I was obsessed with it. What I loved about rowing was that there was only four of us to one coach. The harder you tried, the more you were recognised and the more I got out of it. It was almost one to one. And the rowing club was so small that everyone was almost like family. I’ve never been part of a community like that before.”
The silver medal success of Paul and Gary O’Donovan in Rio 2016 was a significant moment for Cremen. It shattered her preconceptions about Olympic athletes. Suddenly, they were a lot more human. This is not something that you’re destined to achieve. One dictates their own destiny.
“They were so normal. They showed us that it was possible.”
It was around that time that her partnership with Aoife Casey began. They went to the Junior European and World Championships the following year, as their bond strengthened.
It was open weight rowing in those junior days with no kg requirement to obey. And when the time came, the pair were naturally suited to the lightweight category. Cremen was making that transition at a time in her life when she was starting college and dealing with all the pressures that other girls face at that age.
“You’re in a time where body image is so prevalent in your head. When you go into college, you’re so self-conscious. You want to fit in, and there is that pressure to look good and stuff like that top of being an athlete.”
Cremen and Fintan McCarthy celebrating their gold medal at the World Rowing Championships. Detlev Seyb / INPHO
Detlev Seyb / INPHO / INPHO
****
Cremen first opened up about this chapter of her life in an interview with the Irish Examiner earlier this year. Having finished up as a lightweight rower, she felt that was the right time to talk about it. She’s happy to continue the conversation and talk about how she learned to improve her relationship with food.
“When I was a lightweight, I felt like I couldn’t talk about it because I’m there trying to be a role model about fuelling and having been in a place where I had under-fuelled and what that can do to you.
“But then in summertime, we’d all have to cut weight for regattas. So, it’s like I’m there preaching, and then I have to cut weight.”
Reflecting on it now, she knew she needed help. She didn’t deny that she was under-fuelling and had taken the decision to step back from high performance rowing in 2019. She concentrated on rowing for UCC, giving her a more narrow focus which ultimately renewed her love for the sport. The friendships she made during that time contributed hugely to the healing process too. They’re a tight group now, with some of them travelling to Paris for the 2024 Games to support Cremen.
She knew she was standing in her own way. Making peace with that realisation, showing empathy towards herself, and taking the steps to clear her own path was the foundation of her recovery.
“I love rowing, and if I’m under-fuelling, if I’m not eating enough, then I’m holding myself back. And why would I do that? I want to be strong, I want to win. I remember seeing a photo of me and Aoife when we qualified for Tokyo, and I was like, ‘Oh God, I look a bit fat in that.’
“And then I was like, what am I saying? We just qualified for the Olympics, I don’t care. And looking back now, I looked tiny.
“We all have those thoughts. But I think it’s just putting it into perspective, and thinking about what matters.”
Although that was certainly a difficult time for Cremen, she still misses lightweight rowing. It’s the class that moulded her as an athlete and taught her that medals are never guaranteed. Reaching the ‘B’ final in Tokyo followed by a bronze medal at the World Rowing Championships in 2022 did not lead to an inevitable medal at the Paris Olympics.
Lightweight rowing is also where she formed a timeless bond with Casey. They went through the brutal weight cuts together so they could pull the oars out on the water together too. In trying to sweat down before races, they would have bikes in their hotel room and be each other’s support system through the grind.
Over time, they learned how to make it all work within healthy boundaries. Cremen feels energised about the move to heavyweight, but lightweight rowing brings back happy memories too. There’s a warmth in her voice when she mentions the career path she has chosen, and how she can help others who encounter the same challenges she faced.
“That’s why I’m so into the psychology of sport. I’d hate for anyone to feel alone. There is that stigma in sport that you don’t want to seem weak, when it’s just like having a niggle in your shoulder. It’s almost a sign of strength then if you want to talk about it because you want to do something about it.
“It doesn’t last forever and you can come out even stronger.
“I’m in a great space. When I look back to then, I wouldn’t have gone for lunches or dinners because I’d be so self-conscious about what I was eating and I needed so much control over what I was eating. But I just feel really free with food now and it’s a great space to be in. It definitely took a few years to get to that space.”
****
The morning of the mixed Double Sculls at the World Championships was packed with energy. It was almost over-stimulating for Cremen and Fintan McCarthy. They had just returned to the team hotel from their heat where Cremen’s roommate Fiona Murtagh was also preparing for the final of the women’s singles.
“We came in just absolutely buzzing after our heat,” Cremen says taking up the story, the excitement still obvious on her face. “And she was just buzzing, we were all screaming. Her attitude was just so inspiring. I think we can all take something from it.”
With one energy system feeding off another, it was gold medals all round for Ireland that day. Murtagh set the tone with her victorious performance, before the Cremen-McCarthy vessel crossed the line in 6:22.24 to win by 0.7 of a second. The pair didn’t have much time to practice rowing together, only managing to fit in one 9km blast the day before to adjust to each other’s rhythms. Their similar rowing styles and time spent racing each other at training culminated in a top-podium finish.
Now that she’s at the end of her first year in heavyweight rowing, Cremen can head into her off season on the back on a successful transition from the lightweight class. More work lies ahead, of course. The LA Olympics are off in the distance too but that will come into her plans when the time is right.
Rowing for rowing’s sake is the bedrock of her motivation now.
“It’s exciting because I feel like I still have a long way to go in terms of building muscle and maybe putting on a bit of weight. That wasn’t my primary focus this year, even though I was moving up to heavyweight. I wasn’t thinking, ‘I have to put on weight.’ I was just thinking, ’OK, I’m going to fuel more, I’m going to eat more,’ and that’s going to be my goal.
“And I’m just going to enjoy it and see. For me, it’s just enjoying everyday and being with my friends.”
****
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'It doesn't last forever and you can come out even stronger. I feel really free with food now'
IT’S THE THE aftermath of the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, and all the rowers have come together for a gathering.
The races are behind them. This is a chance to decompress from the intense competition, park the rivalries, and meet the human behind the opponent. The drinks are flowing in the Olympic Village as a festival atmosphere takes over to wash away the pressures they came to Tokyo with.
Among the crowd are Ireland’s Mags Cremen and Aoife Casey. Olympic debutants at just 21, they narrowly missed out on a place in the women’s lightweight double sculls ‘A’ final and came second in the ‘B’ final. There’s more to come from them in this sport.
The day eventually brings them into the orbit of the other women who row in the lightweight category. Everyone is enjoying each other’s company as the conversation shifts to sport, and the demands of the lightweight rower. They lead very different lives compared to their heavyweight colleagues.
The weight cuts. The 57kg weight requirement. The sweating down to make that number. The cycling with heavy clothes on. The rib injuries in the winter when bones don’t have enough protection. The difficulty of trying to manage it all and the feeling of being the only one who struggles with striking the balance.
But they’re all discovering something now: they’re not alone. Everyone can relate to each other’s difficulties. Everyone admits to moments where they feel like they can’t cope.
“It’s kind of sad, to be honest, that everyone did struggle,” Cremen tells The 42 in a Cork city café, not far from her home in Rochestown. “But it was really nice to be able to talk about it.”
****
It’s late September 2025. RTÉ have just flagged down the gold medal winners of the mixed Double Sculls at the World Rowing Championships in China. Smiles are stretched across the faces of Fintan McCarthy and Mags Cremen.
McCarthy, a double Olympic gold medallist, is telling the broadcaster how the pair would normally be racing against each other at training, and how it’s nice to be rowing with each other for once. They’re close friends from their time in the lightweight programme, and are newcomers to heavyweight rowing.
The mixed Double Sculls is not an Olympic event, but that could change in future cycles. At the end of the interview, Cremen notes the size of some of the male rowers they came up against in the final.
“And beating them,” McCarthy adds while talking to the camera. “They’re probably about double your size.”
2025 has ushered in an era of change for Cremen. She finished her undergrad degree in UCC, and is now starting into a Masters in Applied Sports and Exercise Psychology.
Life is different in the boat too. That move up to the heavyweight ranks came after the Paris Olympics which marked the end of lightweight rowing. Zoe Hyde is her partner these days. They’ve competed together at all the regattas this year including the recent World Rowing Championships. They won the ‘B’ final of the Women’s Double in a time of 7:00.20.
Cremen’s old Skibbereen comrade Aoife Casey has also switched to heavyweight rowing, but was paired with Emily Hegarty at the World Championships. Cremen and Casey were a double act for seven years, effectively growing up in the water together.
After failing to make the ‘A’ final of the lightweight double sculls in Tokyo, they surpassed that step in Paris last year when they finished fifth in the world. They still remain close friends, but Cremen has enjoyed the process of sharing the oars with other rowers.
“It is great to spread your wings and row with different people. And who knows, we might be rowing together in some sort of boat at some stage in the future? I think we’ll always look out for each other massively.”
Cremen did briefly contemplate stepping away from rowing after the Paris Olympics. The conclusion of the lightweight programme prompted her to think that perhaps everything was coming to a natural end. The option to attempt heavyweight rowing was there for her, but the urge to pursue it didn’t come instantly.
She was 25 at the time and looking at how her world was changing around her.
“All my friends had moved on with their lives,” she says as the world moves around us in The Three Fools café in Douglas Court Shopping Centre. People shuffling in and shuffling out with their orders. Some take a seat, but most are on the move. The first table we pick is in front of a window, where the watery autumnal sun strains Cremen’s sight.
After moving into a more shaded area, we can hear a barista periodically slamming some instrument of the coffee machine in the back. A noisy, but necessary step of their job which makes this writer fret that Cremen’s voice will be drowned out in the recording.
But here, in the calm amidst the chaos, her words rise above the din.
“You’re not really moving with the status quo,” Cremen continues. “You feel that pressure 100% because you’re kind of living the same life that you’ve lived since you were 18.
“But after a short time just thinking about it, I was like, ‘This is an opportunity I can’t give up.’ What if there is a future for me in heavyweight? I suppose just missing the people and missing the sport after a couple of months. I think it’s where I’m at my happiest.”
****
When a young Mags Cremen looked at Olympic athletes on the television, she didn’t believe it could happen for her. They didn’t seem human in her eyes. From another planet. This was their birthright, not hers.
It was hockey for most of her days growing up in Rochestown, attending St Angela’s secondary school. She loved it because that was the sport all of her friends played and the discos on Saturday nights after training were part of the fun. But it was difficult for her to really evolve as a player. With so many girls all fighting for position, game time was hard to come by.
Her best friend was involved in rowing, and her parents encouraged her to follow.
“I joined rowing in 2013, going into 2014 but I was allergic. I was like, ‘No way am I going down there.’ My Mum was best friends with my best friend’s Mum and she wanted to be part of the ‘Rowing Mums.’ They just wanted me to try something new and something that might be good for me.”
But then she took the cool aid. And it took her immediately. She quickly found herself daydreaming about rowing, wishing away the hours at school so she could get to rowing training. What she was missing in hockey was adequately provided for in rowing.
“I was obsessed with it. What I loved about rowing was that there was only four of us to one coach. The harder you tried, the more you were recognised and the more I got out of it. It was almost one to one. And the rowing club was so small that everyone was almost like family. I’ve never been part of a community like that before.”
The silver medal success of Paul and Gary O’Donovan in Rio 2016 was a significant moment for Cremen. It shattered her preconceptions about Olympic athletes. Suddenly, they were a lot more human. This is not something that you’re destined to achieve. One dictates their own destiny.
“They were so normal. They showed us that it was possible.”
It was around that time that her partnership with Aoife Casey began. They went to the Junior European and World Championships the following year, as their bond strengthened.
It was open weight rowing in those junior days with no kg requirement to obey. And when the time came, the pair were naturally suited to the lightweight category. Cremen was making that transition at a time in her life when she was starting college and dealing with all the pressures that other girls face at that age.
“You’re in a time where body image is so prevalent in your head. When you go into college, you’re so self-conscious. You want to fit in, and there is that pressure to look good and stuff like that top of being an athlete.”
****
Cremen first opened up about this chapter of her life in an interview with the Irish Examiner earlier this year. Having finished up as a lightweight rower, she felt that was the right time to talk about it. She’s happy to continue the conversation and talk about how she learned to improve her relationship with food.
“When I was a lightweight, I felt like I couldn’t talk about it because I’m there trying to be a role model about fuelling and having been in a place where I had under-fuelled and what that can do to you.
“But then in summertime, we’d all have to cut weight for regattas. So, it’s like I’m there preaching, and then I have to cut weight.”
Reflecting on it now, she knew she needed help. She didn’t deny that she was under-fuelling and had taken the decision to step back from high performance rowing in 2019. She concentrated on rowing for UCC, giving her a more narrow focus which ultimately renewed her love for the sport. The friendships she made during that time contributed hugely to the healing process too. They’re a tight group now, with some of them travelling to Paris for the 2024 Games to support Cremen.
She knew she was standing in her own way. Making peace with that realisation, showing empathy towards herself, and taking the steps to clear her own path was the foundation of her recovery.
“I love rowing, and if I’m under-fuelling, if I’m not eating enough, then I’m holding myself back. And why would I do that? I want to be strong, I want to win. I remember seeing a photo of me and Aoife when we qualified for Tokyo, and I was like, ‘Oh God, I look a bit fat in that.’
“And then I was like, what am I saying? We just qualified for the Olympics, I don’t care. And looking back now, I looked tiny.
“We all have those thoughts. But I think it’s just putting it into perspective, and thinking about what matters.”
Although that was certainly a difficult time for Cremen, she still misses lightweight rowing. It’s the class that moulded her as an athlete and taught her that medals are never guaranteed. Reaching the ‘B’ final in Tokyo followed by a bronze medal at the World Rowing Championships in 2022 did not lead to an inevitable medal at the Paris Olympics.
Lightweight rowing is also where she formed a timeless bond with Casey. They went through the brutal weight cuts together so they could pull the oars out on the water together too. In trying to sweat down before races, they would have bikes in their hotel room and be each other’s support system through the grind.
Over time, they learned how to make it all work within healthy boundaries. Cremen feels energised about the move to heavyweight, but lightweight rowing brings back happy memories too. There’s a warmth in her voice when she mentions the career path she has chosen, and how she can help others who encounter the same challenges she faced.
“That’s why I’m so into the psychology of sport. I’d hate for anyone to feel alone. There is that stigma in sport that you don’t want to seem weak, when it’s just like having a niggle in your shoulder. It’s almost a sign of strength then if you want to talk about it because you want to do something about it.
“It doesn’t last forever and you can come out even stronger.
“I’m in a great space. When I look back to then, I wouldn’t have gone for lunches or dinners because I’d be so self-conscious about what I was eating and I needed so much control over what I was eating. But I just feel really free with food now and it’s a great space to be in. It definitely took a few years to get to that space.”
****
The morning of the mixed Double Sculls at the World Championships was packed with energy. It was almost over-stimulating for Cremen and Fintan McCarthy. They had just returned to the team hotel from their heat where Cremen’s roommate Fiona Murtagh was also preparing for the final of the women’s singles.
“We came in just absolutely buzzing after our heat,” Cremen says taking up the story, the excitement still obvious on her face. “And she was just buzzing, we were all screaming. Her attitude was just so inspiring. I think we can all take something from it.”
With one energy system feeding off another, it was gold medals all round for Ireland that day. Murtagh set the tone with her victorious performance, before the Cremen-McCarthy vessel crossed the line in 6:22.24 to win by 0.7 of a second. The pair didn’t have much time to practice rowing together, only managing to fit in one 9km blast the day before to adjust to each other’s rhythms. Their similar rowing styles and time spent racing each other at training culminated in a top-podium finish.
Now that she’s at the end of her first year in heavyweight rowing, Cremen can head into her off season on the back on a successful transition from the lightweight class. More work lies ahead, of course. The LA Olympics are off in the distance too but that will come into her plans when the time is right.
Rowing for rowing’s sake is the bedrock of her motivation now.
“It’s exciting because I feel like I still have a long way to go in terms of building muscle and maybe putting on a bit of weight. That wasn’t my primary focus this year, even though I was moving up to heavyweight. I wasn’t thinking, ‘I have to put on weight.’ I was just thinking, ’OK, I’m going to fuel more, I’m going to eat more,’ and that’s going to be my goal.
“And I’m just going to enjoy it and see. For me, it’s just enjoying everyday and being with my friends.”
****
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Body Image Lightweight Rowing Mags Cremen Rowing transition