Terry Paul began his athletic career as a basketball player in high school, but switched to rowing as a coxswain in 1979, which better suited his smaller stature. He competed for the Brock University Badgers of St. Catharines, Ontario from 1983 through 1987 and first represented Canada at a major international tournament at the 1986 World Championships, where he finished eighth in the coxed pairs with Raymond Collier and Robert Marland. He fared better in the coxed fours event at the 1987 edition, alongside Marland, Harold Backer, John Houlding, and Brian Saunderson, and won a bronze medal in the same event at the Summer Universiade. This quintet attended the 1988 Summer Olympics, where they placed ninth, and then split up. Paul was the only one to stay with the coxed fours and came in tenth at the 1989 World Championships with Darren Barber, Darby Berkhout, Andy Crosby, and Bruce Robertson. Paul, Barber, Crosby, Robertson, Marland, and Saunderson then made the move to the eights where, alongside Michael Rascher, Derek Porter, and John Wallace, he won silver at the 1990 World Championships. The crew repeated this feat at the 1991 edition, with Don Telfer in place of Saunderson, and then went on to win gold and set an Olympic record at the 1992 Summer Games (after exchanging Telfer for Michael Forgeron). Paul retired from active competition soon after and began a career as a rowing coach, one that took him to Cornell University and positions on the national rowing organizations for Canada and Switzerland. He was inducted into the Canadian Olympic Hall of Fame in 1994.
Canada