Kate Richardson-Walsh is a sportswoman who led the British women’s field hockey team to a thrilling victory at the Rio Olympics in 2016. She was instrumental in rebuilding the culture and ethos of a team that had come second last in the 2014 Hockey World Cup, driving them towards a... Read more
Kate Richardson-Walsh is a sportswoman who led the British women’s field hockey team to a thrilling victory at the Rio Olympics in 2016. She was instrumental in rebuilding the culture and ethos of a team that had come second last in the 2014 Hockey World Cup, driving them towards a gold medal. She is also one half of the first same-sex married couple to win an Olympic medal on the same team, and is the most-capped female hockey player in the sport’s history.
Kate Richardson-Walsh began her international hockey career at 14 years old when she was selected to play for Great Britain Under-16s. During a 22-year career she competed for the England and Great Britain teams at the top level. These include four Olympics, four World Cups and four Commonwealth Games, in which she won one gold, three silvers and four bronzes. Kate also picked up a gold medal for England in the Eurohockey 2015 Nations Championship.
Kate instilled a high-performance culture at England Women’s hockey, with communication at the heart of everything. With a leadership philosophy that included setting a good example to her players, being self-aware and aware of the players around her, Kate created a distributed leadership culture and encouraged her players to examine their strengths and weaknesses to create a sense of purpose and set a vision. Their eventual mission statement was one word: Gold.
Kate, who has twice been named Player of the Year by the Hockey Writers, retired in 2016 after her team’s winning performance. She is an ambassador for many organisations, including UN Women, the Women’s Sports Trust, and supports disability hockey as an ambassador for Access Sport. She sits on the British and European Olympic Athletes Commissions and was the first British player to be inducted into the European Hockey Foundation’s Hall of Fame. In 2017, Kate and her wife Helen Richardson-Walsh were both awarded the OBE for services to hockey.