West German rowers Volker and his brother Guido Grabow teamed up with Norbert Keßlau and Jörg Puttlitz in the coxless fours at the 1984 Los Angeles and 1988 Seoul Olympics. In 1984 they fnished an unfortunate fourth, but in 1988 captured the bronze medal. In 1983 and 1985 the same four won the World Championships and was awarded the Silver Bay Leaf, Germany’s highest sports award. In 1986 the crew won the silver medal at the Worlds.
In 1978, 1981, and from 1983-87, Volker Grabow also belonged to the crews winning the national championships. Volker added three more titles with the coxed eights. From 1982-84 the Grabow brothers also captured the coxless pairs titles. Volker Grabow later became a research assistant at the Institute for Sport and Didactics at the Technical University of Dortmund.
West Germany