Chris Cook

Chris Cook is an ex Double Olympian & Double Commonwealth swimming champion having completed globally at international level.

He is a former BBC North East Sports Personality of the Year.

Chris is an accomplished motivational business and educational speaker with his keynote talk ‘Two Lengths’

You can book motivational Chris Cook at speaking agent Great British Speakers 01753 439289

Type Of Speaker

Business & Finance Health & Wellbeing Remote Speakers Speaker Sport

More About Chris Cook

After competing for Great Britain for nearly 10 years, Chris hung up the trunks and retired from international swimming and began working with businesses/organisations far and wide to help inspire, mentor and coach people to embrace ‘challenge and change’ for their optimal performance.

Chris has built a reputation as a motivational speaker throughout the last 7 years working from referral to referral, sharing his story and the lessons learnt from the journey with over 400,000 people.

Throughout this time, Chris designed and delivered an Olympic Inspiration Programme for children to schools across Kent (UK) which reached over 300 schools spanning 6 years.

Chris Cook - Olympic swimmer motivational Business Performance Coach keynote speaker at Great British Speakers

In 2011 Chris was a lead mentor on a the ‘Sky Sports Living for Sport’ – inspiration programme across the UK & Ireland. The programme was designed to assist disengaged people from society to get back on track.

This role involved training up former Olympians and World Class Athletes to deliver inspirational talks and mentoring/coaching programmes. The role involved working with the most challenging of young people whilst coaching athletes to transition from sport to mentoring.

During the 2012 Olympic Games in London, Chris was selected to mentor and coach the next generation of Olympians on the ‘Ambition Programme’. This programme involved taking 350 potential Olympians to experience an Olympic games (London). Chris’s role was mentor the athletes to maximise the whole experience and to expand their personal development.

Here and now….Currently, Chris and his wife Erica, run their own Learn to swim business – ‘Swim Buddies’ which has seen the business (located in Darlington, UK) grow from 7 swimmers in their first week in September 2014 through to over 900 children swimming with Swim Buddies every week.

Chris Cook Olympic swimmer motivational Business Performance Coach Swim Buddies keynote speaker at Great British Speakers

Chris’s coaching, speaking and mentoring is centred around personal development. Whether it’s in the water helping swimmers or on dry land in business and life, Chris believes that success is something you attract from the person you become.

Corporate Speaking

Chris will add that ‘something special’ to your business event as he draws out the lessons learnt and the lessons to learn when performing in business and in sport as he shares anecdotal stories of his time as an Olympian and now as a business owner growing and building a business. Delivered with humility, his keynote address is designed to leave your audience inspired by the powerful insights into what it takes for teams to perform at the top of their own game.

Keynote Speaker – Chris works with businesses to ensure that his keynote reflects the challenges and the messages facing business today. His simple approach to facing big life challenges is refreshing and will leave any audience inspired to take personal action. In Chris’s own words – ‘Our results are the sum of our daily habits so make them good ones.’
Areas of focus from Chris’s keynote speeches and workshops:
- Keeping things Simple – 2 lengths of the pool
- Culture – team and organisation
- Motivation
- Developing Character
- Personal Best
- Leadership
- Resilience
- Commitment
- Focus
- Habits

Coaching

Explore what sets world class performers, leaders, teams and organisations apart. Discover how to adapt the methods they use and understand what is serving you in your approach to business, sport and your own performance and what needs to change.

Chris works with individuals, teams and leaders, assisting them to explore how they can harness the very best of their performance in business. Through the face to face meetings with Chris, the web calls and the phone call conversations, Chris will guide you to uncover the very best solution to the challenges you face.

Chris Cook Olympic swimmer - motivational Business Performance Coach keynote speaker at Great British Speakers

Educational & School Talks

Assembly – ‘Dream big… start small’. Your children will be inspired to strive in all they do and to follow their dreams.

Themed Workshops – Following on from the assembly, Chris will deliver interactive workshops designed around the themes children will find interesting and relevant to their everyday challenges.

Workshop themes:

Confidence
Develop Character
Challenge limiting beliefs
Encourage children to stretch outside of what feels comfortable
Goal Setting
Young Leadership development
Wellbeing – Mindfulness, Meditation, healthy choices
Determination & Resilience
Team Building

Call +44 1753 439 289 or email Great British Speakers now to book Olympic swimmer and motivational business speaker Chris Cook for your next live event or video.

Testimonials

Chris takes complex challenges and breaks them down into winning formulas, leaving everyone feeling empowered

Elite4All

Chris was outstanding as the keynote speaker at our recent Management Conference.

His delivery of his inspirational story was excellent, he was able to build a great rapport with our audience and made his story and learning relevant to each and every person in the room.

He stayed on to talk to our delegates, have pictures taken with them and answer all of their questions and demonstrated a keen interest in our business and our people. Needless to say he received excellent feedback from all of our delegates and we look forward to having the opportunity to work with him again in the future.

I would highly recommend Chris to anyone looking for a key note speaker who can inspire, motivate and focus an audience. A tremendous effort very much appreciated.

Parkdean Holiday Parks.

We originally engaged with Chris to deliver a keynote speech at a team event we had planned for April 2020, needless to say the Covid-19 situation meant that it was not possible to bring a large group together at that time so the events were postponed, we eventually ran them in November 2020 splitting them between face to face and virtual events. Chris was an absolute pleasure to work with through all the stops and starts, completely understanding, flexible and just overwhelmingly positive at every step.

When he delivered his talk it was really worth the wait, one of the absolute highlights of our event and something that all of our team will be reflecting on for some time to come, but more than that the way he engaged with our groups throughout the events joining in with all the activities really added a lot of value beyond his initial remit.

If you’re looking for a speaker for an event then you really need to look no further, Chris is absolutely excellent and to top it off genuinely one of the nicest people that I’ve ever met.

Transpennine Route East

Thanks to you, as there were lots on complimentary comments flying around about your ‘address’. I thoroughly enjoyed it too – what a great story with a serious message, using your self-depreciating style of humour, lots of truths to illustrate your points and a laid back, engaging approach which totally hooked our staff, parents and students in. Your personable style and relatable message went down a storm! Hope we’ll see you at Whitworth again!

Whitworth Park School & Sixth Form College

Chris spent the morning at our Kick-Off HE pilot, inspiring young boys who are interested in sport within the North East to aspire towards higher education. The passion and enthusiasm, which was incorporated throughout his speech, captured the attention of not only our young people but our staff immediately, providing moments of reflection and comparison between his experience and theirs. Chris’ care and genuine interest in the boys’ future was commendable and we were delighted for him to stay and facilitate our next workshop of his own accord. Chris is an adaptable, personable professional and a pleasure to work with, we cannot recommend him enough.

North East Raising Aspiration Partnership

Chris has spoken for us on two occasions – first at a leadership training programme to internal staff, followed by a speech at our member awards dinner. Chris is insightful, humorous and motivational, managing to tailor his talks to precisely the right audience. We’d have no hesitation in recommending him.

Northern Housing Consortium