Wrong turn leads ex-shop girl all the way to London

Six years ago Sanita Puspure was working as a shop assistant in Dublin.

Life was good in Ireland for the Latvian native and her husband Kaspers, who was employed as a technician with CR Technics in Dublin Airport. The couple were expecting their second child and all was rosy in their world.

Then one afternoon they took a wrong turn in the capital, and so began a journey that has brought the bubbly single sculls rower to the Olympic Games where she secured a spot in tomorrow’s quarter-final with a third-placed finish in Saturday’s heat.

“We got lost one day going to Dublin Zoo and we saw people out rowing in Islandbridge,” Puspure explained.

“At that stage I didn’t know there was any rowing in Dublin. I just thought that when the second child was born I would come and sit in a boat for a while and lose the weight after the baby and try and have some social life. And we just took it from there.”

Born and raised in Riga, Puspure was an immensely talented young rower, winning medals at the World U23 Championships and the World Student Games. But the equipment was packed away out of sight and her sporting life put on hold with the decision to start a life in Ireland.

She doesn’t baulk when asked to recount the experience. “I like that story myself,” she laughs. “I don’t know how we settled on Ireland. It was a quick decision. The UK was the first thought but I had an uncle living in Ireland so he helped us with the first steps to move there.

“We lived in Dublin first for five years and then came to Cork last year. I didn’t row when I came to Ireland first. Sport wasn’t anywhere in my thoughts. We came here to work then our kids were born and, as I said, I discovered rowing again by accident.”

Puspure quickly found a home with UCD’s Old Collegians Boat Club and began making waves in Irish rowing. Under the guidance of coach Phil O’Keeffe she won national titles in both the single and double sculls. In May she carried that form into international waters when securing her Olympic qualification at Lucerne.

She quit her job working in a shop and is now a full-time athlete. The family also relocated from Dublin to begin a new life in Ballincollig, an easy commute to the National Rowing Centre in Farran.

“The move to Cork has been great,” she admitted. “I’ve had massive steps of improvement. The training regime and coaches there are working really well. Rowing has taken over my life.”

The 30-year-old received her Irish citizenship last year and was emotional when she went to the start line on Saturday in this picturesque corner of England wearing an Irish singlet hearing the cheers of her husband and children, Patrick (5) and Daniela (4), ringing in her ears.

“It’s amazing. I feel really honoured to be able to do that. It’s great to have the Irish supporters behind me, screaming their lungs out.

“It is a very special experience. Of course I was nervous. The start line was fine but the hours before you get to the start line are the miserable ones.

“All you are doing is thinking about what you are going to do and how you are going to race but I did a job and got through to the quarter-finals. I didn’t do a lot of hard work and got through without hurting myself too much. The plan was to start off aggressively and then settle into my own rhythm.

“In the beginning it was a battle between me and the Lithuanian girl [Donata Vistartaite] but then I ended up battling with myself to keep my eye on my own boat and not to look around. It wasn’t a special performance — I’m saving the special ones for later.”