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.
World Rowing, also known as the World Rowing Federation, is the international governing body for rowing. Its current president is Jean-Christophe Rolland who succeeded Denis Oswald at a ceremony held in Lucerne in July 2014.
British Rowing, formerly the Amateur Rowing Association (ARA), is the national governing body for the sport of rowing. It is responsible for the training and selection of individual rowers and crews representing Great Britain and England, and for participation in and the development of rowing in England. Scottish Rowing and Welsh Rowing oversee governance in their respective countries, organise their own teams for the Home International Regatta and input to the GB team organisation.
Rowing is the oldest intercollegiate sport in the United States. The first intercollegiate race was a contest between Yale and Harvard in 1852. In the 2018–19 school year, there were 2,340 male and 7,294 female collegiate rowers in Divisions I, II and III, according to the NCAA. The sport has grown since the first NCAA statistics were compiled for the 1981–82 school year, which reflected 2,053 male and 1,187 female collegiate rowers in the three divisions. Some concern has been raised that some recent female numbers are inflated by non-competing novices.
Lightweight rowing is a category of rowing where limits are placed on the maximum body weight of competitors. According to the International Rowing Federation (FISA), this weight category was introduced "to encourage more universality in the sport especially among nations with less statuesque people".
Rowing New Zealand is the sports governing body for rowing in New Zealand. Its purpose is to provide leadership and support to enable an environment of success for the New Zealand rowing community. This includes secondary schools, clubs, masters, universities and high performance.
The Los Gatos Rowing Club was started in 1979 to provide what was then mostly an eastern U.S. sport, to the kids in the Santa Clara Valley. In the past 20 years, more than 2,000 kids from 15 different high schools have passed through the program. Many have gone onto colleges and universities to row competitively, several have received rowing scholarships, and a few have been selected for Junior National Camps and are trying for the Olympics.
The Schuylkill Navy is an association of amateur rowing clubs of Philadelphia. Founded in 1858, it is the oldest amateur athletic governing body in the United States. The member clubs are all on the Schuylkill River where it flows through Fairmount Park in Philadelphia, mostly on the historic Boathouse Row.
The Marin Rowing Association, located in Greenbrae, California, US is a rowing association and non-profit organization founded in 1968 by Coach R.C. "Bob" Cumming.
Weybridge Rowing Club, founded in 1881, is a rowing club by the Thames in England, on the Surrey bank. The club organises head races, notably the Weybridge Silver Sculls which has had Olympian winners and co-organises a May/June regatta. It consists of a wide range of members: juniors, novices, seniors, masters (veterans) – these include many past and present champions.
The University of Toronto Rowing Club (UTRC) was founded on February 10, 1897 and represents the Varsity Blues at local and international regattas. It is the oldest university rowing club in Canada.
Green Lake Crew (GLC) is a public rowing club in Seattle, Washington (USA), jointly sponsored by the Seattle Parks and Recreation Department and the Rowing Advisory Council. The program is located on the southern shore of Green Lake at the Green Lake Small Craft Center (GLSCC). Green Lake Crew was chartered in 1947 and first went "on the water" in the spring of 1948.
Zsuzsanna "Susan" Francia is a Hungarian–American two time Olympic gold medalist rower. Growing up in Abington, Pennsylvania, she attended Abington Senior High School, followed by the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in 2004 with bachelor's and a master's degrees in Criminology and Sociology. She currently resides in Princeton, New Jersey, and is affiliated with the US Rowing Training Center.
Caryn Davies is an American rower. She won gold medals as the stroke seat in 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. She has served as a Vice President of the U.S. Olympians Association and as athletes' representative to the Board of USRowing.
Anna P. Goodale is an American rower. She has rowed on four world championship U.S. women’s eight crews and competed at the 2008 Summer Olympics, where she won a gold medal in women's eight.
Yasmin Farooq is an American rowing cox and the head coach of the University of Washington women's rowing team. She graduated from Waupun High School in 1984 at Waupun, Wisconsin. She attended the University of Wisconsin where she joined the rowing team in 1984 as a coxswain. She was a member of the 1986 national champion JV eight and served as captain and MVP of the team her senior year. A two-time Olympian and world champion in rowing, Farooq later became a college coach at Stanford University where she helped the Cardinal win its first ever Pac-12 and NCAA titles in rowing. At the University of Washington, her team swept the NCAA Championship for the first-time in history, then repeated the feat in 2019 setting NCAA records in all three events. She has been named Pac-12 coach of the year six times and national coach of the year three times. She was inducted into the USRowing Hall of Fame in 2014 and awarded the Ernestine Bayer Woman of the Year award by USRowing in 2017. In 2021, Farooq was inducted into the Wisconsin Athletics Hall of Fame.
Esther Ruth Lofgren is an American rower and an Olympic gold medalist. She won the gold medal in the women's eight at the 2012 Summer Games in London. Lofgren is a graduate of Harvard College, where she rowed for Radcliffe and was a two-time All-American. She is an eight-time member of the U.S. National Rowing Team and a seven-time World Championship medalist.
Women's rowing is the participation of women in the sport of rowing. Women row in all boat classes, from single scull to coxed eights, across the same age ranges and standards as men, from junior amateur through university-level to elite athlete. Typically men and women compete in separate crews although mixed crews and mixed team events also take place. Coaching for women is similar to that for men.
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.
The United States National Women’s Rowing Team is a select group of elite female athletes who represent the United States in international rowing competitions. The team first competed at the Olympics in 1976 and has had a multitude of successes. The implementation of Title IX during the 1970s had a large and positive impact on women’s collegiate rowing, and allowed for a growth in interest and talent in order for the creation of the national team. The team is selected through a competitive, in-depth process that is facilitated by USRowing each year. Tom Terhaar has been the national women’s head coach since 2001, and has been a part of the team's success in the past decade. The team’s eight (8+) has won the gold medal at every summer Olympics since 2004, and won the World Rowing Championships from 2005 until 2016. The eight (8+) also presently holds the world record at 5:54.160.
