Rowing Club Risk Assessment Template
A water-specific risk assessment written for rowing clubs, not adapted from a generic sports sheet. Download the PDF, walk your stretch of lake, river or harbour with it, and adapt every line to your club. Free, no email address required.
What should a rowing club risk assessment cover?
A rowing risk assessment should cover the water (cold water immersion, capsize, currents, dam structures and obstructions), traffic (other craft, ski lanes, navigation rules, blind points), conditions (lake wind and chop, southerly changes, fog, lightning, heat, darkness), people (swim ability, medical conditions, juniors and supervision ratios) and land-side hazards (manual handling of boats, trestles, trailers and slippery ramps). On the big lakes - Karapiro, Ruataniwha - wind deserves its own row: flat water can turn to whitecaps inside twenty minutes. Each hazard gets a likelihood score, a severity score and named controls, reviewed at least annually and after any incident. NZ clubs should check the finished assessment against Rowing New Zealand's safety guidance.
Download the template
Download PDFFree. No email, no watermark. Structured around the safety topics Rowing New Zealand expects clubs to manage.
How to use it
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1
Walk your water. Do the assessment on your actual stretch - every club's hazards are different. A hydro dam a kilometre downstream, or a harbour ferry lane across your course, changes everything.
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2
Score honestly. Likelihood (1-5) times severity (1-5) gives each hazard a risk rating out of 25. Anything above 15 needs a control that reduces it before crews go afloat.
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3
Name the controls and the owner. "Be careful" is not a control. "No outings when whitecaps are visible from the boatshed ramp, checked by the duty coach before boating" is.
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4
Set the review date. Annually as a minimum, plus after every incident or near miss, and whenever your circumstances change - new water, new boat types, a new school intake for the season.
The hazards in the template
The PDF includes a scored row for each of these, with typical controls filled in as a starting point. Adapt every one to your own water and circumstances.
| Hazard | Who is at risk | Example controls in the template |
|---|---|---|
| Cold water immersion | All rowers, year-round on alpine-fed lakes | Cold-water briefing at the start of each season, capsize drill for new members, layered kit guidance, buddy boating rules through winter |
| Capsize and swim failure | Scullers, novices, juniors | Swim declaration at joining, capsize drill before single sculling, coach boat cover for novice outings |
| Collision with craft or obstruction | All crews | Local circulation pattern taught at induction, circulation map in the boatshed, lights and lookout rules, ski lane and moored-craft awareness |
| Dam structures, river mouths and downstream hazards | All crews | Hard limits marked on the club water map, flow and lake-level checks, no-go zones briefed to every new member |
| Darkness and poor visibility | Early morning school and winter crews | Bow and stern lights required, high-vis kit, restricted outings in fog |
| Weather: lake wind, lightning, heat | All rowers and coaches | Named decision-maker for cancelling, whitecap and wind-limit rule, watch for the southerly change, lightning 30-30 rule, heat guidance for juniors |
| Medical emergency afloat | All rowers | Medical declarations at joining, emergency contacts accessible to coaches, coach boat with throw line and phone |
| Manual handling of boats and trestles | All members, land side | Lifting technique at induction, minimum numbers per boat class, trailer loading rules |
| Juniors and vulnerable adults | Junior and school squads | Safeguarding policy, police vetting for coaches and volunteers working with young people, supervision ratios, parental consent records |
This template is a starting point, not a completed assessment. Your club is responsible for assessing its own water, activities and people. NZ clubs should check the finished document against Rowing New Zealand's current safety guidance, their regional association's requirements and any conditions set by the operator of their waterway.
The risk assessment is a document. The controls are data.
Half the controls in a rowing risk assessment are really record-keeping: who has done a capsize drill, whose swim declaration is on file, which members have medical flags, whether the coach boat driver's qualification is current, which boat is out and who is in it. That is exactly what Row HQ keeps live - member records, qualifications, emergency contacts and outing logs, filled in once and always current. Write the risk assessment with this template; run the controls in Row HQ; spend the time you save on the water. There is also a free interactive risk assessment tool if you want a guided version.
Set up your club freeFree for clubs of up to 20 active members.
Risk assessment FAQs
Does a rowing club legally need a risk assessment?
Treat it as non-negotiable. Every club owes its members, volunteers and visitors a duty of care, and a written, current risk assessment is the standard evidence that the club has taken that duty seriously. Rowing New Zealand expects affiliated clubs to manage safety actively, insurers commonly ask to see risk assessments, and the operator of your lake or harbour may require one as a condition of access. A club that puts junior crews on cold water before dawn without one would struggle to defend that position to anyone. In practice: every rowing club should have one.
How often should the risk assessment be reviewed?
At least once a year, and immediately after any incident or near miss, any change to your water (new moorings, changed lake levels or flows, construction), or any change to your activities such as taking on a school programme or starting harbour outings. The natural rhythm for most NZ clubs is a review before the season starts in spring. Put the review date on the document itself and name the person responsible.
Who should write the club risk assessment?
Someone who knows the water and the club - typically the club safety officer, with input from coaches and the committee. It should not be written by one person at a desk: walk the site, boat the stretch, and involve the people who coach on it at 6am when the fog is still sitting on the lake. The committee should formally adopt the finished document so responsibility is clear.
What safety guidance does Rowing New Zealand provide?
Rowing New Zealand publishes safety guidance for affiliated clubs, schools and regattas, covering areas like cold water, capsize, coach boat operation, safeguarding and event safety. It is guidance rather than a fill-in template, so clubs still need to produce their own risk assessment documents. This template gives you that document structure with rowing-specific hazards pre-loaded; sense-check the finished assessment against Rowing New Zealand's current guidance and anything your regional association or waterway operator requires.
Related
Pair this with the incident report form - the risk assessment says what might happen, the incident log tells you what actually does. There is also a guided interactive rowing risk assessment tool and the full templates library.