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About Five57
Who we are
Five57 is a specialist supplier of quality sports clothing and equipment, primarily for the rowing and watersports communities - but not just for rowers.
We are a family run business with customer service and honesty at our core. We have strong relationships with, and trust, the people behind the products we supply and we want the same with our customers, large and small.
In a competitive market with many large players we believe our commitment to providing a personal service to our customers stands out. We pride ourselves on developing positive relationships, listening carefully to the needs of each customer and creating exciting design options. Kit is designed by us making sure that every piece of kit is custom made and bespoke to your needs. We have a large range of technical fabrics to choose from when designing and manufacturing our kit, a fabric guide of our most popular fabric can be found here.
We want our customers to be happy with us, so if you ever have a question or problem we always encourage you to get in touch. We strongly believe that communication solves most issues. We never shy away from a problem, and work hard on your behalf to find a resolution.
Working in partnership to bring you the best
Custom Kit
We work with a family of high quality brands, designed and manufactured in Canada. Five57 is the primary European distributor for RegattaSport (RS) and Nine-O products. RS has been designing and manufacturing high quality custom kit specifically for rowing and dragon boating for 30 years and Nine-O specialise in technical sport-specific clothing for sports including cycling, american football, ice hockey and lacrosse.
More information about our partnership organisations can be found here:
RegattaSport
Nine-O
Niko Apparel Systems
The owners of Five57, RS and Nine-O are all former National Team athletes in their sport giving them a unique perspective on the importance of providing exceptional performance through kit.
Boat Bags
Bringing you the very best in boat covers, we have partnered with Burnham to make it easier to cover the boat you love with the best custom fit boat covers. Made in New Hampshire USA, Burnham covers are designed and patterned exactly to fit your boat. You choose the colours, fabrics and style and even add your club logo or initials.
What's in a name?
Incidentally, in case you are wondering, the name Five57 comes from Tom’s ‘glory days’ on the water.
Way back, when boats still had some wood in them and the ‘macon’ spoon shape was still the way to go, a young crew came into being which everyone involved soon realised had the makings of something special.
Later that year at the Rowing World Championships of 1991 that crew went on to win the Lightweight 4- event and in doing so were the first crew to dip under 6 minutes in a time of 5:57.6.
That was a good day, and Five57 was chosen to ensure a small bit of history can travel with every order we fulfil.
1991 Rowing World Championships - The crew: Chris Bates (bow), Toby Hessian (stroke) and Tom Kay with the late, great Carl Smith standing. Coached by Allan Whitwell and Ray Sims.