Rowing In Paris: The Gold-Medal-Winning Coxless Men's Four Reflect On The 2024 Olympic Games

When Michael Grady woke up on the morning of Aug. 1, 2024, he said to his three teammates, “We're going to win the Olympics today.”

“I was speaking it into existence,” adds Grady, reflecting on that day.

A few hours later, Liam Corrigan, Justin Best, Nick Mead and Grady did just that. They led the final from start to finish and won the first Olympic gold medal for the U.S. men’s coxless four since the 1960 Games. It was also the first Olympic gold medal for any U.S. men’s boat in 20 years.

“I literally thought I was dreaming because that was the only point of reference that I had for this,” remembers Corrigan, who stroked the four and is now the head of finance for Fuse, a fusion energy company in San Leandro, California. “I had many dreams about rowing and in particular, the Olympic final. … For about a minute or two, I couldn’t really fathom that we had won. It was a pretty surreal feeling.”

Since Paris, the four rowers have all moved with their careers and their lives; two married in the last year, two are engaged. Grady coached the University of Washington men’s rowing team last year and put his gold medal in the UW boat house’s trophy case alongside John Sayre’s medal. Sayre, a UW graduate, won Olympic gold in the coxless four at the 1960 Games.

They have so many memories from the Olympic Games Paris 2024 — and the years that led up to it. Their win and how they accomplished it, they hope, will leave a legacy for the men in U.S. Rowing.

The U.S. men’s coxless four came to the 2,000-meter final with confidence. Best remembers commenting that “this boat is moving fast.” It was confidence gleaned from training together in the boat for the previous two years — and as teammates for years before that.

“I would joke that I talked to my teammates and my coach more than my parents and wife combined for four or five years,” says Mead, who just started a new job working for the global management consulting company McKinsey and lives in New York City with his wife and newly adopted dog.

The four knew what it was like to lose; they had finished runner-up to Great Britain in the men’s four at the 2023 World Rowing Championships. And they had all rowed at the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 (Best, Corrigan, and Mead in the men’s eight, Grady in the four), coming home without any medals. It was a feeling that fueled their motivation. Over the next three years, they prepared for every eventuality.

They even wrote a crew charter when they first gathered to row in the four and talked about their goals. That level of communication was fundamental to their success, says Grady, who will soon start a job as a clinical specialist for cardiac rhythm management in Pittsburgh.

They were not the fittest boat at the 2024 Olympic Games, says Corrigan. Nor did they have the best technique. New Zealand and Great Britain fit those descriptions. But what the U.S. boat had was a psychological bond — a deep trust that each was prepared to do whatever it took to win.

In the Olympic final, New Zealand gained a couple of seats on the U.S.’s lead about halfway through the race. Corrigan called “red,” meaning it was time to raise the stroke rate — to literally see red — and keep the U.S. boat’s bow ball out in front.

“Having trained together since 2019, you have so much trust that when someone makes that call, you’re not going to think about whether the other guys have enough in the tank to do it,” says Mead. “All you have to think about is executing what you’re able to do. It was really second nature.”

“It was a really decisive moment for us in the race,” he adds, “but it was probably two years in the making.”

The U.S. four crossed the finish line 0.85 of a second ahead of New Zealand.

“Pretty much everything went to plan, which was just bizarre to see,” remembers Grady. “I feel like you rarely see those things happen.”

For Corrigan, his memories of the race almost defy words. He was in a flow state, not even aware of the pain. The magnitude of the race — and what they were trying to accomplish — put it on another plane.

“Maybe also the energy of 20,000 people in the crowd and somehow the fact that everyone — the athletes, coaches, the crowd — was treating this event with such importance,” he speculates, “it actually physically changed the mental aspects of the event.”

After they won Olympic gold, it was time to enjoy Paris.

First came the GOATs. Attending a volleyball game, the foursome noticed tennis legend Serena Williams sitting nearby. When the rowers showed her their gold medals, she acquiesced to a photo.

Later, when they zoomed in on the pic, they noticed football’s GOAT Tom Brady in the background photobombing their Serena pic.

Then there were the private moments with family and friends.

Grady and his fiancé went to the Eiffel Tower at night when it was twinkling.

Mead and his fiancé went to dinner at a restaurant where she had eaten with her family as a child. Pierre de Coubertin’s great granddaughter approached their table; de Coubertin is the founder of the modern Olympic Games. She told them who she was, then said, “It’s really nice to see how much you’re enjoying [the Games].”

Corrigan also dined with his parents and soon-to-be fiancé at a restaurant on a side street in Paris. It was a special moment to be with the people who had supported him for so long, “almost a sigh of relief after such an intense period,” he said. “That was a really meaningful moment for me.”

Best got engaged on NBC’s Today Show — on set at the Trocadero with the Eiffel Tower in the background.

“It was pretty special,” says Grady, “and it was so totally Justin.”

Best also has wonderful memories of the friendly Parisiens and the atmosphere in the City of Lights. He walked around the city on the day of the women’s cycling road race. The closed streets were lined with people from different nationalities, cheering the road racers, happy to have their own Olympic moments.

“It really defined the Olympic spirit,” Best says, “especially after Tokyo where there were no fans.

“There were so many other things going on in the world, but in Paris, people could focus on something that unites rather than divides.”

The men from the 2024 Olympic four hope that their medal inspires rowers aiming for the Olympic Games Los Angeles 2028 and beyond: what boys in a boat can do when every single person has bought into the same goal and works together toward it.

In rowing, the boat’s speed is contingent upon everyone moving in sync, and the psychological can manifest in the physical — meaning one person’s bad, or good, mood can be felt down the entire shell.

“You have to set aside differences of opinion and egos in order to focus on how can we row the same way, the most efficient way possible and train as hard as we can to make the boat go as fast as possible,” explains Corrigan. “What we did really well was the psychological structure. We had a buy-in and level of trust that I had never experienced in a boat before. It allowed us to train really hard, be really committed to making every improvement possible. The net result was we won.”

Best could be the best bet (pun intended) to pass this blueprint off to the next generation. He is working on getting “some ducks in a row” to compete at L.A. in 2028.

“Your last dance on home turf,” he says. “How many times does somebody get the opportunity to do that?”