Each Wednesday for a six-week period from June 23 to July 28, one of the newly-minted 2021 inductees to the McGill Sports Hall of Fame will be profiled. In our fifth installment, meet Olympic rower Derek O'Farrell (BSc '07), a native of Unionville, Ont., who currently resides in Ottawa.

Born on June 5, 1983 in Toronto, Derek O'Farrell attended Unionville Public School and St. Michael's College School before enrolling at McGill in 2002, where he majored in physiology and graduated with a science degree in 2007. He later earned an MBA from Carleton in 2016 and a degree in education from the University of Ottawa.

After his McGill years, the 6-foot-3, 187-pound rower had a distinguished career with the Canadian national team, where he competed on an international stage for seven years. O'Farrell rowed for Canada at six world championships, winning four medals. At the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, he was third in the B final to finish ninth overall in the coxless four, along with teammates Will Dean, Anthony Jacob and Michael Wilkinson.

O'Farrell competed for five seasons with the McGill crew, from 2002 to 2006. After racing in a novice boat during his freshman year, he made the rare jump as a sophomore, to the elite heavyweight eight and won gold at the 2003 Canadian indoor championships in Toronto. In his junior year, he won silver with the heavy coxed eight at the 2004 OUA championships and came away with silver in the heavy eight at Canadian University Rowing Association championships, held at the Olympic rowing basin in Montreal.

As a senior, O'Farrell won gold with the heavy eight at the 2005 OUA championships in Welland, Ont., to merit league all-star honours. A recipient of a 2005 Quebec Foundation bursary for athletic excellence, he returned for a solid fifth year in 2006, and collected a pair of silvers at the OUAs in St. Catharines, Ont.

O'Farrell also competed for Canada at the 2005 under-23 world championships in Amsterdam, where he won silver in the men's eight. Among his other international highlights, he competed for Canada at eight World Cup events.

A three-time senior world championship medallist, he won silver in 2009 with the men's eight in Poznan, Poland, and two bronze medals in the coxed pair -- at Eton (England) in 2006 with Andrew Byrnes and Brian Price and at Munich (Germany) in 2007 with Kip McDaniel and Brian Price.

After retiring from competitive rowing, O'Farrell became a coach at an Ottawa-area high school.

Other new laureates joining O'Farrell in the 2021 McGill induction class include basketball Olympian Sylvia Sweeney (B. Mus '75) of Montreal, Olympic swimmer Marianne Limpert of Fredericton, N.B., five-time All-Canadian volleyball player Jennifer Thomson (BEd '09, MA '11) of Rosemere, Que., Gilles Hudon (BA '84), a three-time hockey all-star from Montreal and longtime Montrealer Thomas Thompson (BSc [PE] '58; DipEd '61; MEd '78), a significant fundraiser who was elected in the builder category.

The hallowed Hall now has 163 honoured members, 30 of them Olympians, since the pantheon was initiated in 1996. The induction luncheon is slated to be held Wednesday, Oct. 27, from 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Le Windsor Ballroom on Peel Street. Ticket information will be available in early September. Profiles for previous year's inductees to the McGill Sports Hall of Fame are also available online at: www.mcgillathletics.ca/hof.aspx


SOURCE:
Earl Zukerman
Communications Officer
Athletics & Recreation
McGill University
514-398-7012 (Tel.)
m.athletics.mcgill.ca (mobile website)
www.mcgillathletics.ca
earl.zukerman@mcgill.ca