KEY POINTS:
Departing high-performance boss Andrew Matheson believes he is leaving New Zealand rowing in good shape, but called for a measure of patience in the next couple of years.
Matheson is off this year to run Australia's high-performance programme through to the London Olympics in 2012 in a role broadly similar to that he's held at Rowing New Zealand for almost six years.
The timing was critical, he said, as he felt post-Beijing it was time for a fresh challenge.
"You get to a stage where you need to look at where you're at and whether you've got the passion to keep driving what you are doing at the time," he said yesterday.
Under Matheson and head coach Dick Tonks, New Zealand has enjoyed some stellar occasions, including winning four gold medals at the 2005 World Championships in Japan in the space of 45 minutes; being regulars on the podium at world champs and World Cup regattas and collecting three medals in Beijing last month.
But Matheson warned New Zealand should not get complacent as the next Olympic cycle begins, and suggested the medals might be harder to gather in the next couple of years.
"I think New Zealand is in quite a good place," he said.
"There's a whole pile of talent coming through, some really good athletes like Emma Twigg, [world under-23 single sculling lightweight and open champions] Graham Oberlin-Brown and Joseph Sullivan, [Olympic lightweight double] Peter Taylor and Storm Uru, and that's pretty exciting," Matheson said.
