BIOGRAPHY

Annamarie Phelps CBE OLY | Vice Chair, British Olympic Association 

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Annamarie was elected a Board member, and subsequently Vice Chair, of the British Olympic Association in 2015, having originally served on the Athlete Commission, 1994-1998. As an Executive Committee Member of the European Olympic Committees (EOC) she leads the Gender Equality Diversity and Inclusion Commission, working closely with the IOC, Olympic Solidarity, and GEDI Commissions of both IOC and ANOC. Annamarie was appointed to represent the EOC on the Council of Europe EPAS Consultative Committee for Sport and was elected to the Bureau in 2024.  She is currently chairs the International Working Group on Women & Sport (IWG), the world’s largest network dedicated to enhancing gender equality in sport, hosted in the UK 2022-2026 and whose Global Summit takes place in Birmingham, in 2026.

 

During her term as Chair of the British Horseracing Authority, she brought stakeholders together during the pandemic to be the first professional sport to return to competition; agreed a governance code for bloodstock agents and negotiated fundamental changes to the governance of the sport’s regulator, supporting significant projects to protect riders’ welfare. 

 

As Chair of British Rowing, Annamarie transformed the strategic direction and structure of the governing body, led two major governance reviews and, as Deputy Chairman, had designed and implemented policies for Anti-Doping, Safeguarding and Integrity. She has since supported National and International Federations with governance and safeguarding policy implementation. She chaired the Cycling Independent Review, the first independent review into the culture of a high-performance sport programme in 2016-2017; co-authored the report, Integrity in Sport Mapping the UK Landscape, 2020, for UKAD and has contributed to UK Sport and UK government strategy and policy reviews. 

 

Annamarie is a former World Champion and World Record Holder in rowing and represented Great Britain in women’s eights at the Atlanta Olympic Games, 1996. In 2016 she was awarded a CBE in recognition of her contribution to Rowing.