Ellen Buttrick MBE

Ellen began to lose her eyesight while in her last few years at school but her condition went undiagnosed until her second year studying BSc (Hons) Geography at Northumbria University.

When she was first diagnosed, she remembers the first question she asked the doctor in the hospital was whether her impairment would mean she could row at the Paralympics.

She had already taken a learn to row course at Leeds Rowing Club, which began the same week as she watched the rowing in London 2012. She continued rowing through university and after she received her diagnosis as it felt familiar and normal to her when everything else had changed.

Ellen is very self-motivated and enjoys challenging herself. She saw the Paralympics as a silver lining to her disability – it was a way of reframing her diagnosis and it drove her to train hard and aim for selection at a Paralympic Games. Just 12 months after she first attended a Para-rowing Talent ID day, Ellen Buttrick became a World Champion in the PR3 Mixed Coxed Four. She went on to realise her dream and become Paralympic Champion at the delayed Tokyo 2020 Games. She was awarded an MBE in the 2022 New Year Honours List for Services to Rowing.

After Tokyo, Ellen started a Masters at the London School of Economics in Gender, Policy and Inequalities completing the degree in 2024. Her dissertation focused on the  UK Government’s approach to disability policy.

Ellen had double hip surgery in 2022 which has been one of the biggest challenges of her sporting career. With the support of the medical team at British Rowing and the UKSI Intensive Rehabilitation Unit, she has been able to return to the sport, represent Great Britain in the PR3 Women’s Pair in the 2023 season and trial for selection for the Paris Games.

Alongside her training, Ellen enjoys volunteering regularly and is proud to be a trustee for Love Rowing, British Rowing’s Charitable Foundation. This sees her working on projects and social impact activities, as well as championing more accessible rowing programmes across the UK. Ellen is an ambassador for Girlguiding UK, where she has been a member since the age of 7. She enjoys volunteering weekly at a local Brownie unit in Henley-on-Thames where she moved to in 2019. Ellen participated in the first Women’s Sport Trust Unlocked Programme in 2020 and has recently completed the UK Sport Powered by Purpose programme. She is happiest when outdoors and/or drinking good coffee with friends.