Peterborough Rowing Builder Leach Named to Row Ontario Hall of Fame
One of the founders of rowing in Peterborough was honoured on Monday as Chris Leach was announced as the first member of the 2026 Row Ontario Hall of Fame Class. Leach will enter the Hall in the Builder’s category.
Long before Leach began building the Peterborough rowing community, he was a successful up and coming rower at the St. Catharines Rowing Club. He began rowing in his teen years and was soon one of the top rowers in the province. He became a two-time Olympian, representing Canada in the men’s coxless four at both the 1960 and 1964 Olympics. During his time at the SCRC Leach also began coaching. Following his second Olympics, he moved on to the Don Rowing Club, where he coached for five years and led several crews to gold medals at the CSSRA Championships and Royal Canadian Henley Regatta. In the late-1960’s, Leach moved to Peterborough to study at the newly opened Trent University, where he would leave a lasting legacy in both club and university rowing.
When Leach moved to Peterborough, he found an ideal spot to start a rowing club. With flat water, little competing boat traffic in the early morning training hours, and a wilderness setting close to the city and university, the location was well set up to a house a rowing club. But the task of starting one from scratch was no less daunting. Leach began obtaining the equipment and infrastructure required – namely boats, oars, docks, trailer, and a building – to start the club. He received help along the way from his contacts in the rowing community, and in 1969 the Trent University Rowing Club was born.
Knowing the rowing program needed a reliable fundraiser to raise money, Leach ran with the idea of an annual regatta that would bring other clubs and university programs to the area and showcase what rowing in Peterborough had to offer. In 1971, he founded the first ever Head of the Trent regatta. Now in its 55th year, the Head of the Trent quickly became a favourite of many in the larger Canadian rowing community and grew into the largest of its kind in the country. Known for a beautiful and challenging rowing setting, the regatta is the central piece of Trent University’s homecoming weekend and has become a key reunion spot for many rowing alumni from Trent and beyond.
With the Trent rowing program on solid footing, Leach then established the Peterborough Rowing Club in 1973. The goal in the early years of the community club was to introduce the sport to high school-aged rowers, which would act as a feeder to the Trent rowing program. Many in Peterborough still had little knowledge of rowing so Leach set out to educate and inspire many in the community to participate. Within a few years of starting the PRC, Leach had recruited a generation of young coaches who established rowing programs at five Peterborough high schools. The programs grew from there and over the course of the first ten years under Leach’s leadership, the PRC produced winning crews at every level of rowing in Ontario.
In building the club from scratch, Leach spent countless volunteer hours promoting and introducing the sport to new rowers, along with many other jobs at the club that the public didn’t see. He also served as head coach of the club throughout the 1970’s and coached many PRC and Trent rowers to podiums at the OUAA Championships, Royal Canadian Henley and Ontario Championship regattas. Many of the athletes he coached would go on to the national team program.
Described as a larger-than-life figure, Leach was embraced in Peterborough from the start and set the tone for the culture of the Peterborough rowing community. He inspired an ethos of believing in yourself and created the club motto ‘Step Back Non-Believers’, which continues to be used today. Leach passed away peacefully last year at the age of 83. With the foundation that he helped put in place, the Peterborough Rowing Club continued its growth over the years and is now one of the largest and respected rowing clubs in the country.
Row Ontario will be announcing the inductions of the 2026 Hall of Fame class throughout the week as part of ‘Hall of Fame Week’. Stay tuned this week for more announcements on the 2026 induction class of the Row Ontario Hall of Fame.
The 2023, 2024, 2025 and 2026 induction classes will be honoured in-person at the Row Ontario Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony on Saturday, Nov. 28 in the Niagara area. The HOF induction ceremony is part of the Ontario Rowing Summit weekend. To purchase tickets to the HOF induction ceremony, visit the link below:
