Rowing is one of the finest aerobic sports in the world. Boats and oars have evolved over the years to harness the maximum efficiency of the human body. Thus rowing is considered an all round sport not only for its powerful strokes, but also for the meticulous coordination, precision and utmost discipline that is essential to send the boat racing smoothly through water.

The origins of rowing date back to the beginning of civilization. According to sport historians, the Chinese were the first to participate in the sport of long-boat racing on rivers, whilst paddle and oar racing in Thailand and Sri Lanka date back to the dawn of history. Records also exist of races between state barges in Egypt in 6000 BC.

Modern Rowing, introduced to Sri Lanka by the British around 1860s, is in essence, long-boat racing. The first organised rowing facility was established in Sri Lanka on the Beira Lake around 1860.

Subsequently the Colombo Rowing Club (CRC) was formed in 1864 for expatriate community to indulge in the sport. Until a few years prior to independence, rowing facilities at the CRC were not available to locals. Apart from the Colombo Rowing Club there were two other rowing clubs in Sri Lanka, one in Kandy and the other on the Beira Lake, under the name of the Government Services Boat Club.

The former wound up in the 1950’s and the latter closed down with the construction of the Ramada Hotel (present Cinnamon Lakeside) in the late 1970s.

Rowing, like all other sports introduced during the colonial era, was dominated by the British until the 1950s. For reasons best known to them, rowing was not propagated throughout the island unlike cricket and rugby, but confined mainly to Colombo. This perhaps is the main reason for general misconception about it being an elitist sport. Contrary to notion, rowing is a sport that can be made popular throughout the island, due to the availability of many waterways. The obstacles for broad-basing the sport are merely, the lack of equipment and qualified coaches to introduce the sport in different parts of the island.

History of the Amateur Rowing Association of Sri Lanka -

The Amateur Rowing Association of Sri Lanka (ARASL) was formed in 1964 for the sole purpose of fostering the sport.

Colvin Sirimanne, the first Ceylonese President of the CRC, was elected as the first president of the ARASL with Gerry Silva as the General Secretary. At its inception, the ARASL comprised of four affiliates which has grown to the present 14 affiliates.

Within two years of forming the ARASL, a national regatta amongst the affiliated clubs was conducted under the stewardship of Garry Silva. It was the intention of the ARASL to conduct the national regatta annually, but during the initial years, this did not happen due to many reasons.

However, during the past years the rowing nationals have been conducted regularly and today, it remains the most looked forward to event amongst the rowing community.

When we look at the history of the Sri Lankan rowing, you are expected to look at the history of the Colombo Rowing Club (CRC) because Sri Lanka rowing was originated by the CRC. It began in 1860 almost century before the ARASL was introduced.

Rowing in Sri Lanka can be traced back to the 12th of July, 1864 when, according to the ‘Ceylon Times,’ a proposal was circulated amongst the residents of Colombo for the purchase of three boats and the construction of a boat shed on the banks of the Beira Lake. A meeting was convened and chaired at Colombo’s public library on the 15th of July by Sir Edward Creasy, Ceylon’s Chief Justice, and a formal club was born under the name, ‘The Colombo Rowing Club.’

The club commenced maintaining records in the same year, making the CRC the nation’s oldest private members club. With Sir Creasy being a member of the prestigious Oxford Union, the CRC adopted the colours of Oxford blue and white on its banner.

The sport grew from strength to strength, urged on by its enthusiastic membership, which included some pre-eminent names of the time such as V.A. Julius and Harry Creasy, both eminent lawyers, and Sir T.L. Villiers, a member of the legislative council and board of governors of St. Thomas’ College.

1898 saw the genesis of the club’s first international regatta, the annual Madras-Colombo boat race, which was initiated against its sister club across the Palk straits.

The Madras Boat Club was established only a few years after the CRC and the annual boat race is today the second oldest surviving inter-institutional boat race in the world, after the renowned Oxford-Cambridge.

Ladies’ events were added to the regatta in 1968 and with the regatta encompassing more pairs and sculling events, the overall ‘Deepam’ trophy was introduced in 1973.

With the development of rowing in the Indian sub-continent, the Amateur Rowing Association of the East (ARAE) was formed in 1940 with clubs from Chennai, Kolkata, Poona, Karachi and Colombo forming its nucleus.

In fact, the Calcutta Rowing Club, which predates the CRC, provides further evidence to the fact that rowing was one of the first sporting activities to be formally established by the British in its colonies. Today, the annual ARAE regatta is a keenly contested event amongst amateur oarsmen and women of the region and is a mainstay of Sri Lanka’s annual rowing calendar.

The sport continued its rapid growth in the post independence era. The Far Eastern Amateur Rowing

Association (FEARA) was born in Hong Kong in 1954, of which the CRC became a fully-fledged member. The FEARA regatta is today a biennial event encompassing a multitude of clubs and nations from across South and South East Asia, Colombo having hosted it on numerous occasions including during its 140th year anniversary.

Membership too continued to grow, with institutional examples such as the Joseph Frazer nursing home forming the backbone of ladies’ rowing in 1964 and Royal College and St. Peter’s College forming the foundations of future oarsmen in 1959.

The ’50s and ’60s also saw a series of watershed events such as the election of the Club’s first Sri Lankan president in the late Colvin Sirimanne in 1958, its first Sri Lankan Captain Alavi Mohommed in 1964 and the Club’s first Sri Lankan Secretary Nihal Vitharane in 1962.

The fleets, which play such a pivotal and important role in the development of the sport, too were augmented in the ’60s by generous donations from the likes of Ceylon Trading Co., one of Colombo’s premier trading groups, who donated a series of fours, coxless pairs and sculls, all of which went on to perform yeoman service to the sport for over 25 years. Graciousness of the German Embassy saw the addition of two Olympic class Empacher fours in 1984 and the club, on its own merits, acquired a further fleet of modern Burgashell and Empacher boats in the early ’90s.

1964 saw rowing maturing into a national sport with the formation of the Amateur Rowing Association of Sri Lanka (ARASL).

Initially founded under the aegis of the CRC and a further membership comprising of the University of Colombo, Royal and St. Thomas’ Colleges, the ARASL today has 14 institutions under its wing, and is a fully-fledged member of rowing’s international governing body, the FISA. It is governed under the Ministry of Sports, and is the premier body entrusted with the promotion and conduct of the sport within the country.

In 2005, the ARASL conducted Sri Lanka’s 22nd Annual Rowing Nationals, holding over 100 races over five days with the participation of 12 institutions. These comprised of 2 universities, 4 boys schools, 2 girls schools, 2 affiliated clubs and 2 clubs from the armed forces, and it is worthy to note that Ladies’ College and Musaeus College form the vanguard of women’s rowing in Sri Lanka now.

The ARASL is also responsible for training and forming teams to represent Sri Lanka at a National level and has fielded crews at the Asian Games in Busan, Korea, in 2002 and the 2004 South Asian Federation (SAF) Games in Karachi, Pakistan. At the latter, it brought credit to the nation by winning a series of silver and bronze medals.

The Association took the sport to new heights in 2006 as it hosted SAF Games in Colombo, with the introduction of state of the art infrastructure in the form of new fleets of carbon fiber boats and an international standard 2000m course on the Bolgoda Lake, and had its sights firmly set on the 2008 Asian Games in Qatar.

Thus, from meager and humble beginnings of three boats and a shed on the banks of the Beira Lake, started by a handful of spirited individuals, the sport of rowing has evolved and grown into a national sport governed by a formal constitution and representative bodies, representing a full cross section of the country’s demographic profile, and would no doubt continue to foster the highest level of camaraderie, goodwill and competition, as always, in ‘the spirit of rowing.’