Rowing, sometimes called crew in the United States, is the sport of racing boats using oars. It differs from paddling sports in that rowing oars are attached to the boat using oarlocks, while paddles are not connected to the boat. Rowing is divided into two disciplines: sculling and sweep rowing. In sculling, each rower holds two oars—one in each hand, while in sweep rowing each rower holds one oar with both hands. There are several boat classes in which athletes may compete, ranging from single sculls, occupied by one person, to shells with eight rowers and a coxswain, called eights. There are a wide variety of course types and formats of racing, but most elite and championship level racing is conducted on calm water courses 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) long with several lanes marked using buoys.
Rowing has been part of the Summer Olympics since its debut in the 1900 Games. Rowing was on the program at the 1896 Summer Olympics but was cancelled due to bad weather. Only men were allowed to compete until the women's events were introduced at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal which gave national federations the incentive to support women's events and catalysed growth in women's rowing. Lightweight rowing events were introduced to the games in 1996. Qualifying for the rowing events is under the jurisdiction of the World Rowing Federation. World Rowing predates the modern Olympics and was the first international sport federation to join the modern Olympic movement.
Vesta Rowing Club is a rowing club based on the Tideway of the River Thames in Putney, London, England. It was founded in 1870.
Imperial College Boat Club is the rowing club for Imperial College and has its boat house on the River Thames on the Putney embankment, London, United Kingdom. It was founded in 1919. The alumni also run a boat club which is known as the Queen's Tower Boat Club and both crews occasionally row together as a composite in competition.
Neptune Rowing Club, founded in 1908, is located on the River Liffey at Islandbridge, Dublin. It is one of the largest clubs in Ireland, steeped in history and is housed in a new boathouse that was opened in March 2010 by the former president of Ireland Mary Robbinson.
Dublin University Boat Club (DUBC) is the Rowing club of Trinity College Dublin. The club operates from its boat house at the Irish National War Memorial Gardens, Islandbridge, on the South Bank of the River Liffey. The club colours are black and white with a royal blue shield bearing the arms of Trinity College. Isabel Ormiston Doyle is the current Captain of the club, and the first female captain in the club's history.
Durham University Boat Club (DUBC) is the rowing club of Durham University. In recent years, DUBC has cemented itself as one of the strongest university boat clubs in Great Britain. Under the leadership of former British Olympian Wade Hall-Craggs, DUBC notably won the BUCS Victor Ludorum for ten consecutive years (2004-2013), and has produced a number of athletes that have competed internationally at European and World Championship level.
Newcastle University Boat Club (NUBC) is the rowing club of Newcastle University, UK. Established in March 1911 as the boat club for Armstrong College, it celebrated its centenary in 2011, when was also appointed High Performance Programme for heavyweight men and women by British Rowing. In the past 20 years current students and alumni won 60 international vests for GB.
University of London Boat Club is the rowing club for the University of London and its member institutions, many of which also have their own boat clubs. The club has its boathouse on the Thames in Chiswick, London, UK. It is a designated High-Performance Programme funded by British Rowing.
Chris Morgan is an Australian former representative rower. He was a national champion, two-time world champion, three time Olympian and Olympic medal winner from Adelaide, South Australia. He won world championships in both sculls and in sweep-oared boat classes.
Caryn Davies is an American rower. She is the winner of the 2023 Thomas Keller Medal, the most prestigious international award in the sport of rowing, and the only American to have ever won this award. She won gold medals as the stroke seat of the U.S. women's eight at the 2012 Summer Olympics and the 2008 Summer Olympics. In April 2015 Davies stroked Oxford University to victory in the first ever women's Oxford/Cambridge boat race held on the same stretch of the river Thames in London where the men's Oxford/Cambridge race has been held since 1829. She was the most highly decorated Olympian to take part in either [men's or women's] race. In 2012 Davies was ranked number 4 in the world by the International Rowing Federation. At the 2004 Olympic Games she won a silver medal in the women's eight. Davies has won more Olympic medals than any other U.S. oarswoman. The 2008 U.S. women's eight, of which she was a part, was named FISA crew of the year. Davies is from Ithaca, New York, where she graduated from Ithaca High School, and rowed with the Cascadilla Boat Club. Davies was on the Radcliffe College (Harvard) Crew Team and was a member on Radcliffe's 2003 NCAA champion Varsity 8, and overall team champion. In 2013, she was a visiting student at Pembroke College, Oxford, where she stroked the college men's eight to a victory in both Torpids and the Oxford University Summer Eights races. In 2013–14 Davies took up Polynesian outrigger canoeing in Hawaii, winning the State novice championship and placing 4th in the long-distance race na-wahine-o-ke-kai with her team from the Outrigger Canoe Club. In 2013, she was inducted into the New York Athletic Club Hall of Fame and in 2022 into the Harvard University Athletics Hall of Fame.
City of Cambridge Rowing Club (CCRC) is the oldest 'town' rowing and sculling club in Cambridge, UK, and with about 300 members, it has one of the largest active rowing memberships in the region. The club's colours are dark blue, with a band of claret sandwiched between two bands of 'old gold'.
Quintin Boat Club (QBC) is a rowing club based at the University of Westminster Boathouse on the River Thames, close to Chiswick Bridge in Chiswick, West London. Formally constituted in 1907, it evolved out of the Regent Street Polytechnic’s rowing club which was started in 1879. In 1888, the polytechnic's founder, Quintin Hogg, paid to have a boathouse built for it at Chiswick and also paid for a fleet of boats.
The Vesper Boat Club is an amateur rowing club located at #10 Boathouse Row in the historic Boathouse Row of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1865 as the Washington Barge Club, the club's name was changed to Vesper Boat Club in 1870.
Daniel Noonan is an Australian former representative rower. He was a national champion, a world champion, a dual Olympian and an Olympic medal winner.
Agecroft Rowing Club is a rowing club based at Salford Quays, Greater Manchester, England. It was formerly based close to the Agecroft Hall in Pendleton 2 miles (3.2 km) north. Its current location is its third within today's City of Salford on a site close to the city centre of Manchester.
Dublin University Ladies Boat Club (DULBC) is a Competitive rowing sports club in Dublin, Ireland. It is the Ladies' Rowing club of Trinity College Dublin, often informally called "Trinity Ladies" rowing club. The club colours are black and pink with white 'TRINITY' lettering and a shield bearing the arms of Trinity College.
Rowing Ireland, formerly the Irish Amateur Rowing Union, is the governing body of rowing for Ireland. It is a cross-border organisation administering the sport in both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.
Luke Letcher is an Australian representative rower - a national champion, an underage world champion and an Olympian. He won a world title at the 2016 World Rowing U23 Championships in Australia's U23 quad scull. He raced in the Australian men's quad scull at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics to a bronze medal.
UCD Boat Club or University College Dublin Boat Club, founded in 1917, is the rowing club of University College Dublin. It is based in Islandbridge in Dublin, along the River Liffey, and also trains on Blessington Lake.
