Jordan Cracknell: ‘I hope James stands again – but I think Reform are more organised than the Tories'

Telegraph

6 hours ago

'Do you really row?' were the first words Jordan Cracknell uttered to her now husband, the Olympic rower James Cracknell, when they met.
She laughs, recalling how she found herself sitting next to him for a matriculation photo for Peterhouse College, Cambridge, in 2018. Fresh off a plane from her native New York, Jordan was there to study for an MBA, while Cracknell was studying for an MPhil in human evolution, and preparing to become the oldest ever competitor in the Boat Race.
'James wasn't wearing a tie, so the porter handed him one saying this was the best rowing tie they had. And I'm looking at this guy, who looks really thin, and I'm thinking, 'This guy does not look like an athlete'.'
'He liked the fact that I didn't know him'
The double Olympic gold medalist – who'd just finished filming Celebrity Island with Bear Grylls – was understandably bemused. Rather than enumerating all the ways he was a fairly big deal in the rowing world, he said a simple yes, and their chat moved onto their respective studies. And so the American left the encounter none the wiser.
With hindsight Jordan says: 'I think he found it really refreshing. He liked the fact that I didn't know him, and I had no preconceived notions whatsoever.'
After all, since his 20s, Cracknell, now 53, had grown up in the spotlight. The years of competing in rowing for Great Britain turned into years of executing extraordinary feats, such as rowing the Atlantic with his friend, the broadcaster Ben Fogle. Then there were the difficult years that followed his being struck from behind by a petrol tanker in 2010 while cycling in Arizona (which we'll return to later). And so to find himself sitting next to someone who had no idea about any of this, must have been a novelty.
Over the next few weeks, Jordan and Cracknell kept running into each other at college events and found themselves gravitating towards each other.
The appeal for Jordan? 'He was not as nerdy as other people,' smiles the 39-year-old. 'You have to understand Peterhouse is very small, and a lot of the PhD students focus on religion. One was studying sarcasm in the bible, so super esoteric. Those conversations were not for me or James. And I didn't know anyone.'
We are in the light and airy communal area of her office in west London. A native New Yorker, Jordan grew up on the Upper East Side ('all very Gossip Girl '), but there's nothing intimidatingly Uptown Girl about her. Dressed in simple jeans, white shirt and pumps, she laughs frequently and fully at the series of events that have led to her now calling England home.
'My plan wasn't to come to England and fall in love'
Today, she commuted from the home she shares with Cracknell in Henley, although the pair also have a pad in Fulham. It's a life that she could never have imagined for herself when she packed her suitcase and left Manhattan and her job in finance for a year of study.
'My plan wasn't to come and fall in love. After all, so many people meet online now, it's so rare to meet in person,' she says.
The decision to come to Europe to study followed years concentrating on her career, leading to a desire to spend some proper time in Europe travelling.
Instead, she ended up being initiated into the rarefied world of British rowing. Over six years on, and she's not only fully acquainted with Henley Royal Regatta – which begins on July 1 – but has supported James through a general election, all while maintaining her own career; Jordan is also the author of a children's book, You Can Count On Penny, that aims to inspire a love of maths in the young.
Back in 2018, however, she remembers, three weeks into first term, a young college friend of hers trying to tell her about the kind of profile the Olympian Cracknell had. Jordan was still slightly underawed.
'When you turn on the Olympics in the States, all the programming is focused towards swimming and gymnastics. That's why Michael Phelps and Simone Biles are huge.
'Even later when I started dating James, he was talking about events in the Olympics that I had no idea existed. The coverage in the UK and Europe is much more rounded than in the US.'
As the pair got closer, even Cracknell tried to prepare her for how public his life was, but still it didn't land. 'I was like, 'Yeah, yeah'. I grew up in New York, I went to school with Christie Brinkley and Billy Joel's daughter. In New York, you ignore celebrities. Everyone's famous for something.'
She finally started to get it when on a night out at Wetherspoons a drunken hen party guest asked her, 'Do you know who this man is? This is an asset to the United Kingdom.'
'I thought that was really funny, and so did James,' says Jordan.
By the New Year of 2019, having spent a month in the US for Christmas, but talking on the phone with Cracknell every day, Jordan knew the relationship was something serious.
Still, it was a closeness that only their group of Cambridge friends knew about. From the beginning, Cracknell had been open with her about the fact that he and his wife, the TV presenter Bev Turner, mother to his three children, had separated the previous year. However, their separation was only announced publicly in March 2019, leading to inevitable news headlines.
'It was weird to see the press coverage about our relationship at first. It didn't help that there was a picture of him grabbing my behind,' laughs Jordan. 'All my American friends thought it was so funny, which helped me laugh at the situation as well.'
And then came the Boat Race that April. 'It was crazy. Piers Morgan was trying to get him on the phone ahead of the race. There was a complete media blackout.' Cracknell went on to be the oldest winner ever, at the age of 46.
At what point did Cracknell talk to her about his accident in Arizona, and the brain injury that followed?
'He told me he had been in an accident. With James, the way the information about his life was shared, it was all very piecemeal. It came out in fits and spurts.'
It was in 2019, as a guest at a dinner for Headway, the brain injury association that Cracknell is vice-president of, that she really started to understand brain injuries. Even today, they don't talk about it on a day to day basis.
'It's a terrible thing to go through. Not just the brain injury, but the PTSD of being involved in an accident like that. It was traumatic, not just for James, but his entire family.'
Jordan met Cracknell's children, his parents, and sister, in their first years of dating. He also met her mum and brothers – her father having died of a heart attack when she was 19. And when Jordan's MBA finished, the couple committed to a transatlantic relationship.
'He was on Strictly at the time, so a lot of the flying was up to me. Commuting transatlantically is not the most fun, especially in economy,' laughs Jordan, who at 6ft has enviably long limbs.
It was a struggle to try and watch the show while in New York. Jordan recalls finding an English pub called The Churchill and asking them to put it on. 'The two drunks at the bar got really into it as well,' she laughs.
Her friends in the US, meanwhile, were convinced she was dating a knight, failing to understand the difference between an OBE and a knighthood.
Eventually Jordan spoke to her boss about the idea of going back to England, who was supportive of the idea of her setting up a London office. She moved over permanently in October 2019, with her two elderly cats, flying to Paris, and then driving the last leg so they didn't have to go in cargo.
Home became a rented flat in Chelsea, which is where she and Cracknell found themselves when the pandemic started. Cracknell put his rowing machine on the balcony – and Jordan tried rowing for the first time.
'James gave me tips, which was really nice. I'd row for 20 minutes and be pretty happy, and then he'd be on it for two hours,' she laughs.
Jordan found a novel way to fill the lockdown time, watching some of Cracknell's documentaries, from rowing the Atlantic, to coming 11th in the Marathon des Sables. 'I learnt a lot,' she says. And of course, she has got to know Ben Fogle and his family in real life, too.
'I never expected James to go into politics'
It was in January 2021, while on a weekend trip to Cambridge, that Cracknell proposed, with the couple choosing to marry that August in London.
'My mum said it was the tallest wedding she'd ever been to,' laughs Jordan. 'She's about 5ft 3in, so she was this tiny lady surrounded by tall men.'
There were also some uninvited guests, with Jordan having to eject some members of the press who had gate-crashed the reception at the RAC club, and were at the bar trying to get drinks.
How has she handled the public interest in hers and Cracknell's life together? 'I've gotten used to it. There are no books on how to deal with it, no dummies' manual,' she laughs. 'It sits better with me now, I guess.'
One dummies book she did buy though, was about British politics. 'That was a whole other thing. I was not ever expecting James to tell me he wanted to do politics.'
In September 2023, Cracknell was selected as the Conservative candidate for Colchester. Jordan joined him canvassing in the rain, both of them wearing out their trainers during 10-hour shifts in the rain.
'I learnt a lot,' she reflects. 'I really understood what the issues are for the average British person outside of London, their worries and concerns about jobs, the economy, immigration.'
In the 2024 general election, Cracknell lost to the Labour candidate.
It was a fascinating learning experience for Jordan, who has long been interested in politics. Back home she is a Democrat, saying they have more in common with UK conservatives, while Republicans are closer to Reform in outlook. 'Everything is more Left-wing in the UK,' she says.
She follows US politics with interest and sees Trump's re-election as a sign that the Democrats are failing their party base.
'Biden really fumbled it, and Kamala didn't really have a lot of time,' she says. 'I think people would have appreciated having a Democratic primary [to formally elect a candidate]. It was just mismanaged.'
Even now, she says the Democrats aren't reorganising themselves in an electable way. 'It's unfair that the octogenarians are in charge. We should have more young people coming up from the bottom. It's terrible the establishment stays, and stifles this growth. As long as that keeps happening, we're just going to have Trump or Vance.'
'If he ran again, I would be there knocking on doors'
In the UK, she is impressed by how Reform run their campaigns. 'It's a very well organised party,' she says. 'The Conservatives do everything by paper, filling out damp forms on doorsteps, that then have to be digitally inputted. Whereas Reform are sending out personalised mailings to constituents. It's something to think about,' she says. 'I'm not certain of what Labour or Lib Dems do, but I think the Green Party is getting really organised, too.'
She is supportive of any further attempts Cracknell decides to make to be elected, saying: 'I actually really hope that James runs for politics again. We've been through an election, and we know what works and what doesn't work. It kind of depends on what happens in the next few years in politics. Certainly, if he ran again, I would be there by his side knocking on doors.'
First, there's that Royal Regatta. In previous years she's always made sure friends' visits to the UK coincided with the event. 'They all love it. They love the dressing up aspect, we always have a good time.
'The top comment is, 'We don't have anything like this in the States'. I guess the closest we have is polo, but those are very expensive to go to. We don't have this very nice rowing regatta in a very picturesque place.'
Henley life is otherwise peaceful and quiet. The couple now have three dogs. It's not unheard of for Matthew Pinsent to drop round with his own to say hello. She and Cracknell occasionally go out on the water too.
'It's so funny because I was so worried about falling in. And he was like, 'I don't want to fall in too. It's fine'. He's a really good teacher. He really breaks it down so nicely and is so certain of himself. You feel you can really trust him.'
Every day she thinks about the day before she flew to England to start her MBA.
'I went to the beach at the Rockaways. I was wearing the skinniest bikini, and I remember lying in the sun getting all tanned. If you'd told me that day at that beach, what would have happened after that flight, I would never have believed you.'