Rowing Software for New Zealand University Boat Clubs

Built for university boat clubs

Rowing software for university boat clubs

Built for New Zealand university boat clubs. Designed for the annual committee handover, multiple squads, lean budgets, and the NZ University Rowing Championships at Lake Ruataniwha, the Trans Tasman Test Series, and the club regattas that fill out the autumn season.

Book a demo Set up your club free

No card needed. Setup in a day. Free roster import for the freshers' intake each semester.

Crew selection screen showing lineup building for a university rowing squad

Why NZ university boat clubs need their own software

Rowing software for NZ university boat clubs runs every operational layer of a uni programme from one platform: training scheduling across squads, crew selection, fundraising, regatta entries, fleet management, alumni relations, and the audit trail your students' association or sport office requires. Row HQ is built for the way New Zealand university rowing actually runs, from the University of Otago - whose club won the NZ Club of the Year award in 2025 - through to Canterbury, Victoria, Auckland, and Waikato.

New Zealand university boat clubs face the same structural problem every year: new rowers arrive in February, the club is run by an elected committee on lean budgets alongside a thin paid coaching layer, and the season runs from autumn head races through to the NZ University Rowing Champs at Ruataniwha in April and the Trans Tasman Test Series against Australian universities. A generic platform with no concept of annual handover, no alumni tracking, and no Rowing NZ-aligned reporting cannot run a NZ uni programme properly. Row HQ has those three built in.

Three audiences, one platform

One platform, three groups. Captains run the club, coaches run training, and the students' association or sport office can see what is going on without weekly check-ins.

Head coach / coaching staff

The coaching staff can:

Schedule training across senior, novice, women's and combined squads
Build crew lineups from live availability with one source of truth
Take attendance with one tap per rower
Track erg scores, body weight, and rower progression year-on-year
Push announcements to a squad or whole programme

Captain of boats & committee

Your elected captain and committee can:

Run O-week sign-ups and learn-to-row
Plan training camps and trip rosters
Coordinate alumni outreach and fundraising
Hand the club over cleanly at AGM
Keep the students' association or sport office informed without weekly meetings

Members

Members see in their phone:

Training schedule and boathouse locations
Their crew for the next regatta
Travel rosters and camp details
Erg history and personal progression
Direct messaging to coaching staff

See what each role actually sees

Same data, three views. Tap a tab to see how Row HQ looks for the coaching staff, the captain and committee, and the members.

Plan a session. Build the crew. Check who is on the water.

Head coach editing a training session for the senior squad

Coach assigning rowers to crews for the NZ University Champs

Coach availability and weekly schedule view

Run O-week intake. Manage the roster. Alert the squad. Hand over without losing data.

Captain viewing the club-wide membership dashboard

Squad info. Erg progression. Regatta schedule. All in one app.

Member viewing their squad lineup and crew assignments

Member's personal erg history and PB tracking

Upcoming regattas and NZ University Champs travel details

Built for the way NZ uni rowing actually works

Multi-squad management

Senior, novice, women's, alumni - every squad gets its own coaches, calendar, and roster while the head coach sees the programme-wide view.

Alumni and supporter tracking

Built-in alumni roster and supporter segmentation, integrated with regatta announcements and end-of-season fundraising appeals.

Training camps and trips

Pre-season camps, away regattas, Trans Tasman travel, Ruataniwha accommodation - rosters, travel info, and finance tracking.

Athlete progression year-on-year

Erg history, weight, crew history, and training load preserved across the rowing career, even after committee handover.

Students' association / sport office reporting

Attendance, welfare, finance, and end-of-season reviews formatted for university sport audit.

Built for the annual committee handover

Captain and committee roles transfer in two clicks at AGM. The outgoing committee logs out, the new committee logs in, every roster and historical record stays in place.

Data integrity through handover

Built so your data outlasts the committee

A NZ university boat club turns over every year - new committee, new intake, sometimes new coaches. Row HQ is built so the club's history, alumni list, crew records, and erg history survive every AGM and every committee election. Otago University Rowing Club, NZ Club of the Year 2025, runs on the same operational pressures that Row HQ is designed to solve.

Two-click handover with zero data loss between committees
Alumni records persist with consent tracking after graduation
Full audit trail for students' association / sport office oversight
Encrypted cloud hosting
Encrypted at rest and in transit, NZ Privacy Act 2020 aligned

NZ Privacy Act 2020 Aligned

Cloud-Hosted

Encrypted in transit and at rest

Audit Log

Two-Click Handover

Alumni Consent Tracking

Free up to 20 members. No card needed.

Get rowing software the next committee will thank you for

Free roster import for the O-week intake, full feature access, and a real person walks you through setup. Most clubs are live within a day.

Set up your club free Book a 20-min walkthrough

How a NZ university boat club actually uses Row HQ

Three workflows that come up every season - and how Row HQ collapses each one.

Captain dashboard showing the club-wide membership view

Annual handover

A committee hands over without losing a single record

When the outgoing committee logs out and the new committee logs in, every roster, alumni record, fleet log, and historical crew record stays in place. No more chasing last year's captain for spreadsheets they took with them.

Two-click role transfer at AGM
Alumni and supporter records persist across years
Fleet log, finance, crew history all preserved

See the admin dashboard

Coach assigning rowers to crews for the NZ University Championships

Crew selection

Crews for NZ University Champs and Trans Tasman in real time, not on a whiteboard

Live availability across every squad, drag-and-drop crew builder, and instant publication to the rowers' phones the moment a crew is set.

Live availability for every rower
Drag-and-drop crew assignment
Instant publication to every rower

See the coach tools

Rower erg log showing personal best progression over multiple seasons

Rower progression

Track erg progression across the rowing career

Every erg score, weight, training load, and crew record stays with the rower record across every committee election. The next coach inherits the full progression history, not a half-remembered impression.

Erg PB tracking with full history
Year-over-year training load summaries
Survives every committee handover

See the training tools

Uni boat club without Row HQ vs with

Job to do

WhatsApp + spreadsheet

Row HQ

Training attendance

Manual head count, lost in scroll

One tap, auto-recorded

Crew for the next regatta

Whiteboard at the boathouse

Live availability, drag and drop, published

O-week sign-up

Spreadsheet from last year's captain

Public signup form, auto-roster build

Tracking subs and trip payments

Manual spreadsheet, treasurer chases

Stripe billing built in, treasurer dashboard

End-of-year handover to next committee

Files on personal laptop

Roles transfer, history preserved

Alumni database for fundraising

Captain's personal email list

Built-in alumni roster, segmented outreach

A typical NZ uni boat club loses weeks every year to AGM handover - the outgoing captain takes the alumni list, the supporter records, the fleet log, and the freshers' pipeline with them, all on a personal laptop. Row HQ replaces that with two-click role transfer at AGM. The club keeps everything. The committee just changes.

How NZ uni boat clubs hand over on Row HQ

Designed for Otago, Canterbury, Victoria, Auckland, Waikato, and Massey

See pricing

NZ university rowing software FAQs

Is Row HQ for elite uni boat clubs or recreational clubs?

Both. The same platform supports high-performance clubs competing at the NZ University Champs and the Trans Tasman Test Series, and recreational programmes at smaller campuses. Each club toggles which features they need at setup. Clubs of up to 20 active members are free; above that, pricing scales in flat monthly bands by active member count.

How does Row HQ handle the annual committee handover?

Captain and committee roles transfer in two clicks at AGM. The outgoing committee logs out, the new committee logs in, and every roster, alumni record, fleet log, and historical crew record stays in place. The data does not live on anyone's personal laptop.

Where is our club's data stored?

Your club's data is held on hardened enterprise cloud infrastructure in a UK data centre, encrypted at rest and in transit. Row HQ is operated under the New Zealand Privacy Act 2020 - member data is processed under comparable privacy safeguards consistent with the 13 Information Privacy Principles. We can share our sub-processor list and hosting documentation on request.

What happens to alumni data after they graduate?

Alumni records persist after rowers graduate, with consent tracking. The captain or alumni officer can segment outreach (recent grads, capital campaign donors, regatta supporters) and integrate fundraising appeals with regatta-day announcements. Alumni can opt out of communication at any time and request a full export of their data.

Can it handle multiple squads (senior, novice, women's)?

Yes. Each squad gets its own coaches, calendar, roster and reports while the head coach sees the programme-wide view. Members can be in multiple squads if needed.

Does it integrate with university student systems?

We import roster from CSV at the start of each semester and export attendance, finance, and welfare reports for the students' association or sport office. Direct integrations are on the roadmap.

How does alumni tracking work?

Alumni records persist after rowers graduate. The captain or alumni officer can segment outreach (recent grads, capital campaign donors, regatta supporters) and integrate fundraising appeals with regatta-day announcements.

Is Row HQ free for university clubs?

Clubs of up to 20 active members use the full platform free, for good - no card, no feature limit. Above 20 members you pay a flat monthly band by active member count, with every feature included on every band.