Ellen Tomek initially joined her college rowing team as a way to avoid the “freshman 15,” but it turned into something much more, ultimately leading to three Olympic Games.
When she made the under-23 national rowing team after graduation, she next set her sights on an Olympic dream. She emailed the U.S. national team head coach — five times — to show her determination to get to the next level.
“I always had a lot of strong women in my life,” Ellen said. “I was really close to both my grandmothers and they were just the toughest women out there, doing everything a man would do. Not necessarily athletics, but just kind of the attitude.”
That never-give-up or give-in attitude gave her the confidence to ask for what she wanted, a trait she would find useful in business later in life.
Eventually, the head coach for the U.S. national women’s rowing team returned one of her many emails with the date of their first practice. “Be in Princeton,” he said.
I was like, "Oh my gosh, I have three weeks to move to New Jersey!"
Dream to reality
That fall, Ellen met the women’s national team athletes. Watching them train in Princeton, N.J., her Olympic dream felt more within reach. “It didn't seem like such a long shot,” she said.
By 2008, Ellen was headed to her first Olympic Games — the Olympic Games Beijing 2008.
“I surprised myself by making the team in 2008,” she said. “You're seeing athletes from all around the world. Honestly, you just walk around with your eyes huge, mouth a little bit open, like, ‘Wow, I'm here.’ Your first Olympic Games is really, really crazy.”
In Beijing, she raced against women who were already Olympic champions, some already medal-winning, but aimed to do her best no matter what. Of course, with an outdoor sport, factors like the weather can impact your performance.
“Obviously, you really want a medal. But I asked myself, ‘Do I feel like I did everything I could leading up to it and on that day?’ I've always felt like the answer was yes.”
Music to suit the mood
Following the team’s fifth place finish in Beijing, Ellen trained for the Olympic Games London 2012, but a rib injury forced her to sit out.
“I couldn't be on the water with my teammates. I was doing a lot of indoor training on a stationary bike to keep my upper body resting. It is pretty isolating,” she recalled.
She relied on music to get her through the setback, choosing tunes that reflected her somber mood.
“I had teammates and friends who would make fun of me because I would be listening to these really emotional, slower songs to get me through the training, rather than something upbeat and poppy, because that's not how I was feeling. I was angry and grinding and I wanted the music to feel that way too.”
Calm before the competition
As a pre-game ritual, Ellen leaned more into breathwork and meditation than music.
“When it came to racing, I always felt like I would do better if I was able to calm myself and meditate and really become in tune with my body,” she said.
That instinct to remain calm in the face of stressful situations helped Ellen land a role as a director of North America Risk through the Visa Champions program (née the Olympians and Paralympians Business Development Program)—a two-year rotational program designed for retiring athletes.
Interviewers from the program told Ellen they thought she would do well in a client-facing role.
“I didn't even know that was my strength,” she recalled. “I was caught off guard. I thought, ‘That sounds terrifying. I feel like I should just be at a computer, focused on one thing. Don't put me in front of people!’”
But her media training, her ability to keep calm, and her confidence to speak her mind all worked in her favor in the business world.
“In fraud, sometimes you're having really tough conversations, but you're also trying to maintain a positive relationship at the same time with the client. The people running the Visa Champions program saw that ability in me before I saw that in myself.”
Using your voice
Training most of her adult life as a U.S. Olympian, going to the Olympic Games Rio 2016 and the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020, Ellen thought at first that a transition to the corporate world would be challenging.
“I didn't have all this payments knowledge. I didn't have to be good at data analysis and [slide decks and spreadsheets]. Instead, the Visa Champions program valued what I did bring to the table – the ability to work as a team and manage special situations, all the stuff that takes so much time to learn and grow into. That was a huge opportunity.”
She hit a turning point the first time she had the courage to speak up at a meeting about something that didn’t seem to check out quite right.
“Being able to have a disagreement and work through it in front of a group of people and it being okay was a positive thing, and the discussion that came from that was really positive. Everyone was learning and taking something away, and that wouldn't have happened if I hadn't spoken up at that moment. I felt really proud of the growth there as well.”