Caileigh Filmer has stepped away from high-performance rowing. The three-time Olympian announced on 2 November that she is ending a career of more than a decade with the Canadian national team. Rowing Canada Aviron said a back injury sustained in November 2025 had interrupted her campaign for LA 2028, and that despite her efforts to regain full fitness she could not return to rowing pain-free.
"Letting go of a goal you've poured your soul into is one of the hardest things an athlete can face," Filmer said. "I feel incredibly fortunate to be able to walk away, both mentally and physically healthy, still loving this sport, and looking back on this chapter in such a good light."
Filmer’s Olympic Medals: From Tokyo Bronze to Paris Silver
Filmer made her Olympic debut at 19 in the Canadian eight that finished fifth in Rio. Two years later she and Hillary Janssens were world champions in the W2- in Plovdiv, having already cracked Grace Prendergast and Kerri Gowler's unbeaten Olympiad in the semi-final by nearly two seconds. Pair bronze followed at the 2019 worlds, a year in which Filmer had stepped away from rowing for three months to prioritise her mental health.
In Tokyo the Canadians led at 500m and halfway before New Zealand came through in the third 500. They held on for bronze in 6:52.10, 0.65sec off silver, for Canada's first Olympic women's pair medal since Barcelona 1992.
Then she left for track cycling. Speaking to me for Row360 in 2022, she said: "The big signal for me was when my former teammates talked about going back and I didn't have any feelings of, ‘maybe I should too’. Which is a relief!"
She returned to the national team in 2023, finishing 18th in the pair at that year's worlds.
The following year she raced in the eight that won World Cup II in Lucerne and then Olympic silver in Vaires-sur-Marne at Paris 2024, clocking 5:58.84, holding off Great Britain by 0.67sec.
"Coming back into the sport, I was just inspired to help the legacy of Canadian women rowing," she said after the Paris final. She told Row360: “Everyone in the world better watch out because Canadian rowing is here and it’s not leaving any time soon.”
At her last worlds, in 2025, she doubled up in the W8+ and W4-. She raced in the heats, but was substituted out of both crews for medical reasons and did not race either B-final. Her crews finished seventh and eighth overall, respectively.
Filmer on Injuries and Mental Health
Injury had shadowed her long before last November. In her 2022 interview with Row360 she described compartment syndrome in her forearms and rib stress fractures in the run-up to Tokyo, and wondered whether stretching to match the length of taller crewmates had pushed her into vulnerable positions.
"I had to deal with chronic injuries almost every single month of my rowing," she said. "It is a question still with a question mark: Why was my body always breaking down?"
Her openness about mental health may outlast the medals. In a first-person account for Team Canada, she described being diagnosed with clinical depression after the 2018 world title and asking staff to tell her teammates, so that anyone else struggling might feel able to talk.
Rowing Canada Aviron chief executive Jennifer Fitzpatrick acknowledged it: "Her medals are part of our history, but so is the way she spoke openly about mental health and opened the door for others to do the same."
In her 2022 interview with Row360, Filmer reflected on how her approach to mental health had evolved: “As you change you need to support yourself differently. I've certainly had to shape and shift the ways I support myself.”
Canadian Rowing After Filmer: The Road to LA 2028
Filmer was not part of the team Canada selected for the 2026 World Championships, which sent a W8+ built on returning internationals and senior debutants. The federation has since created a director of pathway role linking its domestic and high-performance programmes, with LA 2028 and Brisbane 2032 in view.
When she left for the velodrome in 2021, Filmer was relaxed about her successors: "There is always new talent coming up. It will be exciting to watch whoever is going to end up racing that pair next."
