The Big Dance

Words: Tom Ransley / Photography: Benedict Tufnell

In this house of make-believe, blood-splattered Halloween horror mingles with the gun-toting Wild West, and racks of ‘70s-inspired disco jumpsuits are parked parallel to clerical habits. Fake pearls, feather boas, Venetian masks, mirror balls, monocles, manacles and toweringly tall, ivory-coloured wigs line the walls.

Oversized pink rabbits dangle from the ceiling, their big fluffy ears bent double beneath suspended pipes; mannequins lurk around each corner; headless gladiators wrestle for space with centurions; and a dusty, mustard-coloured Winnie the Pooh in a tangerine tunic sits among a motley bunch of gawkish cartoon characters.

I’m in North London in a costume shop basement with two stars of the Dutch sculling team. Beneath the bunnies the former Dutch double, Laila Youssifou and Roos de Jong, scour the rails for their choice of outfit. The owner of the shop approaches, she has a request: “Dot wants a picture with you two...” Seamstress Dot squeals with excitement. Its Olympic fever come early.

“There’s this little voice in your head, 'Did we make the right decision?’ And you have no guarantee.”

Roos and Laila are in London for the weekend celebrating their Olympic selection in the best way possible: a cover shoot for Row360.

Following winter testing they have been named in the quad. (Laila: “We had trials in December, in the single, double and on the erg. The selections were revealed to us at the start of this year. If nothing goes wrong, we will stay in this quad”.) It’s the same lineup as the one that won a gold medal in Lucerne last year and silver behind the British at the 2023 World Rowing Championships in Belgrade, Serbia.

The duo made their Olympic debuts, separately, at Tokyo. Laila finished sixth in the quad and Roos won a bronze medal in the double behind Romania and New Zealand. In 2022 they successfully joined forces in the double (reviving their bronze-medal-winning