The AIS VIS ASPIRE Coach Program co-facilitator on the barriers she navigated – and why she is building a different path for those who come next.
When her Romanian coach told Hannah Every-Hall OLY that returning to elite rowing after having two children was not possible, she filed it under the wrong column.
“I love finding a way to prove people wrong.”
She did. In 2012, Every-Hall competed in the A Final of the London 2012 Olympic Games, one of the first Australian mothers to compete in rowing at an Olympic Games, having rebuilt her career almost entirely from scratch.
Born and raised in Bendigo, Every-Hall came to rowing late, picking it up seriously at university in Melbourne while studying sports physiology. She made the Under-23 Nations Cup squad within 18 months, winning the Lightweight Women’s Double Sculls in Hamburg, then took gold at the 2002 World Rowing Championships in the Lightweight Women’s Quad. Illness derailed her path to the 2004 Olympic trials and she stepped away from elite competition to start a family. Eight years later, she came back.
The return took a support network she built herself: her husband managing night shifts during heavy training blocks, a university student as an au pair, grandparents, rowing friends, and a first-of-its-kind Rowing Australia funding scheme that allowed families to visit the European training base.
Every-Hall is clear about what that experience taught her.
“There was no roadmap,” she says.
“No program that said: here’s how you come back after having children and still make an Olympic final.”
Every-Hall is now General Manager High Performance at the Victorian Institute of Sport (VIS) and a co-facilitator of the AIS VIS ASPIRE Coach Program, shaping the environment to support others to forge their paths towards excellence. The Women in High Performance Coaching (WiHPC) Project, which underpins the AIS VIS ASPIRE Coach Program, confirms what she already knows from experience.
The problem, she says, is structural.
“It’s not a talent problem. The pipeline is leaking because of structural barriers: pay, career clarity, professional development, support networks.”
ASPIRE is a three-day program hosted at Lakeside Stadium in October 2026 for a cohort of up to 30 early-career women coaches, supported by virtual small-group sessions across the following 12 months. The program is open to women who have coached at state or national level and aspire to build careers in high performance sport. Every-Hall’s message to anyone considering applying is direct.
“Don’t assume your experience isn’t sufficient. If you have unfinished business in high performance sport, if there’s something in you that says you have more to give, that’s exactly who we’re looking for.”
Applications are open and close 2 August 2026.
Free information sessions run Thursday 23 July (1:00pm–2:00pm AEST) and Tuesday 28 July (11:00am–12:00pm AEST). Contact: [email protected] with any questions.
