World Rowing

The world governing body for the sport of rowing was founded as the Fédération Internationale des Sociétés d’Aviron (FISA) on 25 June 1892, in Torino, Italy, with five founding members: Adriatica (rowing clubs from Trieste, which belonged to Austria at that time, but they did not want to represent Austria), Belgium, France, Italy, and Switzerland. The name rebrand to the current World Rowing occurred in October 2020.

Male rowers started appearing at the Olympic Games at Paris 1900, and the first World Rowing Championships were staged in Lucerne, Switzerland, in 1962. Women’s boat classes were included in the World Championship programme from 1974 onwards, that edition of the event also being held in Lucerne. The Olympic début for women rowers would come two years later, at Montreal 1976.

Also governed by World Rowing, Para rowing was integrated into the World Rowing Championships programme in 2002. The discipline would first appear at the Paralympic Games in 2008.

World Rowing also oversees the non-Olympic disciplines of indoor rowing and coastal rowing. The World Indoor Rowing Championships had its first edition in 2018, in Alexandria, Virginia, United States, and the discipline also appeared as an invitational sport at the 2017 edition of the World Games. World Rowing Coastal Championships for endurance events have been held since Guernsey 2006, and the World Rowing Beach Sprint Finals have been staged for coastal rowers since 2019, in Shenzhen, China. This rowing coastal beach sprints variant will make its début as an Olympic discipline at Los Angeles 2028.

As of January 2026, World Rowing has 158 member federations. Since 2014, the former Olympic gold medalist in rowing Jean-Christophe Rolland of France has been the president of the federation, and former Olympic rower Denis Oswald of Switzerland (World Rowing former president from 1989 to 2014) has been the federation’s Honorary President. The organization’s headquarters is located in Lausanne, Switzerland.