Early years: 1878–2000
The Ludwigshafener Ruderverein was founded on August 1, 1878. [3] During the first meeting, the 16 founding members elected C. H. Andersen to be the first chairman of the club. Andersen was also the person who, as a former member the Allgemeiner Alster club in Hamburg, played a vital role in pushing forward the club's status.
In the early years, the number of members rose and in 1898 the boathouse in Ludwigshafen was opened. At the second olympic games in Paris in 1900 the coxed four of Ludwigshafen won the bronze medal. Twelve years later in 1912 Hermann Wilker, Otto Fickeisen, Rudolf Fickeisen, Albert Arnheiter and cox Otto Maier won the gold medal at the olympic games in Stockholm. World War I stopped the development of the rowing club and the club was resumed in 1921.
In 1936 Paul Söllner won the next gold medal in the coxed four in co-operation with rowers from the rowing club of Mannheim. During World War II, 57 members of the club were lost and the boathouse was destroyed completely by air attacks on the city of Ludwigshafen and the chemical plants in Ludwigshafen.
After the war the Ludwigshafener Ruderverein was the first refounded rowing club in the French occupation zone. The boathouse had to be rebuilt and in 1947 the first win on a national regatta was announced.
In 1972 Alois Bierl won the gold medal at the olympic games in Munich in the coxed four alongside Winfried Ringwald who received fifth place with the German eight.
Later in the nineties, the womens rowing groups were very successful. Beate Brühe together with Andrea Klapeck received fourth place at the world championships 1991 in the quadruple four race. Three years later Andrea Klapeck became world champion in the eight and was also member of the German rowing crew for the olympic games in 1996 in Atlanta. In the women's lightweights division, Karin Stephan achieved at the worldchampionsships in 1998 the silver medal and in 2000 the gold medal.
2000–present
In the years 2000 to 2005 Sandra Schnitzer, Anja Hannöver and Martin and Jochen Kühner were the most successful athletes in national and international competitions. In the recent past the rowing club of Ludwigshafen focused on training and education of young rowers and was able to send respectively one young athlete to the World Rowing Junior Championships in 2010 and 2011.
In the years 2009 and 2010 the Ludwigshafener Ruderverein provided in co-operation with the Mannheimer Ruderclub an eight for the German premier league of rowing.
Furthermore the club was very successful in the masters division. In the last years Detlev Jantz and Jürgen Hock won many titles at the FISA World Rowing Masters and crews from the Ludwigshafener Ruderverein achieved one victory in 2012 and good positions in subsequent years at the longest non-stop rowing competition in the world, the Tour du Lac Léman.
