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Former Canadian national team oarsman Don Lindsay and the Lindsay Family Foundation have made a $1 million gift to Rowing Canada Aviron’s under-construction National Training Centre, with the facility’s new boathouse to be named the Lindsay Boathouse.
This isn’t Lindsay’s first million-dollar gift to rowing. In 2023, through the Lindsay Family Foundation, he gave $1 million towards construction of prep school Upper Canada College’s new boathouse on Toronto’s Outer Harbour, also named The Lindsay Boathouse.
The National Training Centre is being built on Quamichan Lake in North Cowichan, British Columbia as the primary training base for Canada’s high-performance rowers and will also host training and selection camps for developing national-team athletes.
The project is now under construction, though portions of the new training center are already in use, including temporary training space, change rooms, showers and bathrooms, accessible parking, and completed docks.
Lindsay’s $1 million contribution has allowed Rowing Canada to expand the project with additional athlete amenities, gathering spaces, and other improvements.
A member of Canada’s national team in 1980, Lindsay went on to a long career in business, including 18 years as president and CEO of Teck Resources. He is currently chair of Manulife Financial Corporation and Trans Mountain Corporation.
Lindsay said his own experience in rowing—and the lessons he took from the sport—were behind the gift.
“I’m a big believer that sport teaches important values and skills that help you succeed long term in life,” Lindsay said. “The degree of dedication, hard work, persistence, discipline and respect that athletes learn through sport are so important in every other aspect of life.”
As a national-team athlete, Lindsay competed during an era when Canadian rowers often had to pay significant portions of their own training and competition expenses. He said providing today’s athletes with a first-class training environment can allow them to concentrate more fully on competing.
“I think investing in sport to provide facilities that help athletes take their minds off other distractions and just focus on the task at hand, training to the best of their abilities and being as competitive as they can be, is incredibly important,” he said.
Lindsay also sees the boathouse as more than simply a place to store boats and train. Over time, he hopes it becomes part of the identity and history of Canada’s national team.
“To the extent that you create a nicer boathouse, you create an atmosphere of quality where people are proud to be there,” Lindsay said. “Over time, the boathouse will acquire photos of previous champions and various trophies and become part of the history of the sport. Ideally, we’re creating a permanent national team training centre where athletes, when they arrive, know there’s a bit of magic there.”
His own connection to rowing began well before the national team. Lindsay recalls a 1975 national high-school championship race in which his crew, not expected to contend, won gold in a photo finish. He credits the experience with changing his outlook on what he could accomplish.
“That changed my whole life because you learn that you can do it,” he said. “If you work hard enough, you too can succeed at anything. That’s what rowing teaches.”
Mike Bryden, a Rowing Canada board member and chair of the National Training Centre Project Committee, called the donation “an extraordinary investment in the future of Canadian rowing.”
“His support has helped us realize the vision for the National Training Centre and create a facility that can elevate Canadian athletes for years to come,” Bryden said.
Although the new boathouse will bear his family’s name, Lindsay said the purpose of the gift is the athletes who will train there—and, he hopes, encouraging others to support them.
“Rowing was a big factor in whatever success I had, and I want to support the institutions and activities that helped me along the way,” Lindsay said.
“Things worked out pretty well for me, and so it’s time to give back, to say thank you. If that gets other people to say, ‘Maybe I should support as well,’ then that’s great. That’s what we want to happen.”
