Grosvenor Rowing Club - Chester | UK Rowing Clubs | Row HQ

Grosvenor Rowing Club is based at The Groves in Chester and rows on the River Dee. Its clubhouse, gym, rowing-machine suite and boat fleet support beginners, recreational members and racing crews.

The club was founded in 1869 for clerks and assistants in Chester. Its first recorded victory was the Wirral Challenge Cup at Chester Regatta in 1889; women became full members in 1973, Sheila Barrett became the first woman in Britain to captain a mixed rowing club in 1979, and the current boathouse opened in 1982.

Grosvenor runs junior, novice, senior, high-performance, masters, adaptive and leisure squads, and also hosts Chester University Boat Club. Its facilities include boats for different experience levels, a free-weights gym with 18 rowing machines, a clubhouse with bar and catering, and parking.

The club was an original British Rowing pioneer for Learn to Row when its courses began in 2008. More than 500 people have graduated, with former beginners later racing at Henley Royal, winning at Henley Women's Regatta and reaching Henley Masters finals.

Helen Mangan became the first Grosvenor athlete to represent Great Britain in 1989, and Juliet Machan won a lightweight-pairs world title in 1998. The men's squad reached the Wyfold Challenge Cup semi-final at Henley Royal in 2007, the furthest it had progressed there.

The women's squad won Henley Women's Regatta's Lester Trophy for club coxed fours in 2014 and reached the club-eights final in 2016. In 2019 Lucy Iball won the aspirational single sculls at Henley Women's and became Grosvenor's first female sculler to qualify for Henley Royal.