POH Joan

General
RETURN TO NURSING
In early 2019, she took a 16-month period of unpaid leave from her job as a registered nurse in the renal department at Tan Tock Seng Hospital in Singapore to concentrate on her rowing career and ambitions to compete at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo. She decided to return to the profession in 2020, however, during the COVID-19 pandemic and reduced her rowing training schedule from three sessions a day to two. "As a nurse, I was beginning to feel a growing sense of responsibility and I felt like it was time for me to put on my uniform and go back to work to help in any way I could. In the face of an outbreak in Singapore, I felt compelled to shelve my rowing dreams for a bit and give something back because my hospital has been really supportive and beyond what I could have ever asked for from an employer during the years that I have been following my ambitions in sport. I wasn't a winning athlete. All I had was a dream and they saw value in it." In March 2021 she went back on unpaid leave and returned to full-time rowing training. (straitstimes.com, 10 May 2021; gov.s, 18 Oct 2020; worldrowing.com, 03 Jun 2020)

FROM DRAGON BOAT TO SAILING TO ROWING
She represented Singapore in dragon boat at the 2010 Asian Games in Guangzhou, People's Republic of China, but quit the sport in 2012 so she could qualify as a nurse. In 2013 one of her teammates from the dragon boat team then signed her up for an athlete recruitment programme that was looking for potential sailors. She was selected to form a partnership with Dawn Liu, initially in the 470 class and then in the 49er FX class, but the pair missed out on qualification for the 2013 South East Asian Games in Nay Pyi Taw, Myanmar. Liu also broke her hand at the 2014 World Championships in Santander, Spain, which meant they were unable to qualify for the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro. Days later their partnership ended. "I remember being very confused in the boat. I thought I was going to be a dead weight. Sailing is very tactical, I worked very hard in the boat but I had no idea what was going on in the race. I didn't find it very fulfilling." She began rowing in December 2014 and capsized in her first session and had to be rescued by motorboat. She subsequently qualified for the 2015 South East Asian Games in Singapore and won bronze in coxless pair at the event. (SportsDeskOnline, 03 Jun 2021; todayonline.com, 21 Oct 2017)