Australian Rowing at the World Rowing Under 23 Championships

History of the Regatta

The concept of this regatta was first mooted in the early 1970s. The competition is a showcase for tomorrow's champions and is open to all athletes under 23 who have not won a medal at the Olympic Games or Senior World Championships.

On 20 July 1975 delegates from Belgium, France, Italy and Switzerland who conducted a male-only competition called the Match des Quatre Nations, plus two other federations, met in Italy to discuss the notion of providing international competition to athletes of the "second level". It was decided a new class of competition had to be developed so that younger athletes could compete against peers of similar age and experience. This class was initially called debutantes, and was later changed to Senior B.

As more federations joined this competition, name changes followed including Match des Cinq Nations and Match des Six Nations. In the late 1970s, the name Match des Seniors was coined. This was a difficult decision as the first competition was held in Macon, France. In French, "seniors" means "old boys"!

Until 1979 the competition was run under the supervision of an honorary general secretary and since then, by an international committee. In 1992 it was decided to give the competition a more generic name and it was changed to Coupe des Nations, or the Nations Cup. The first Nations Cup regatta was held in 1993. By 1996, some 34 member federations of the Nations Cup competed, with every continent represented.

The event has created some challenge cups as follows:

Men	Hamburg Cup
Men's Lightweight	Ostrig Cup
Women	J Waefelaer Cup
Women's Lightweight	Frankrig Cup
Combined Lightweight	Spanien Cup
Overall Point score	Oaolo d'Aloja Cup

The winners of these cups are as follows:

	Men	Men's Lwt	Women	Women's Lwt	Comb. Lwt	Combined
1976	FRG		FRA
1977	FRA		NED
1978	FRA		FRA
1979	FRG		FRG
1980	FRG		FRG
1981	FRA		FRG
0982	FRG		NED
1983	FRG		ITA/FRG
1984	FRG		FRG			FRG
1985	ITA		FRG			FRG
1986	FRG	FRG	FRG			FRG
1987	FRG	ITA	FRG	ITA	ITA	FRG
1988	ITA	FRG	FRG	DEN/FRG	FRG	FRG
1989	FRG	ITA	FRG	DEN	DEN	FRG
1990	FRG	ITA	GBR	SUI	SUI	FRG
1991	GER	ITA	GER	ITA	ITA	GER
1992	GER	GER	GER	GER	GER	GER
1993	ITA	GER	GER	GER	GER	GER
1994	ITA	DEN	GER	ITA	ITA	GER
1995	GER	GER	GER	GER	GER	GER
1996	GER	GER	GER	NED	GER	GER
1997	ITA	AUS	AUS	EST	AUS	GER
1998	GER	GRE	GER	SUI	ITA	GER
1999	GER	AUS	GER	AUS	AUS	GER
2000
2001
2002
2003

The Nations Cup continued until 2004 when the regatta came under the auspices of FISA and became the FISA World Under 23 Regatta. From 2005 it has become known as the World Rowing Under 23 Championships.