Sam Bosworth

Sam Bosworth began rowing in 2009 at Christ’s College and Avon Rowing Club at the age of 16.

After coxing his crew to win the Maadi Cup in 2012 he was selected in his first New Zealand team, the junior men’s coxed four. The crew took an impressive gold medal at the 2012 World Rowing Junior Championships in Plovdiv, Bulgaria. Following this stellar performance Sam joined Southern Rowing Performance Centre and was selected in the U23 men’s coxed four in 2013. The crew took home a silver medal from the World Rowing U23 Championships in Linz, Austria, a result that Sam would repeat twice more in 2014 and 2015 before finally winning gold in the 2016 event.

Sam then joined the New Zealand summer squad for the domestic season and was selected to cox the elite women’s eight in 2017 after coxswains became gender neutral at international level. His crew picked up World Rowing Cup gold and silver at Poznan and Lucerne respectively, along with a Henley Royal Regatta win, and went on to win bronze at the World Rowing Championships in Sarasota, Florida, in an agonisingly close race in which Sam became the first male to cox a women’s crew to a medal.

Sam coxed the women’s eight again in 2018 when the crew won silver and gold at World Rowing Cups II and III before finishing 7th at the World Rowing Championships in Plovdiv, Bulgaria. In 2019 Sam changed from the women’s eight to the men’s, and was part of the first-ever New Zealand men’s eight to win at the Henley Royal Regatta. This was then backed up by a bronze at World Rowing Cup III. Sam coxed the men’s crew to a 6th-place finish at the World Rowing Championships.

Then after only securing a boat for Tokyo via the last-chance qualification regatta in Lucerne in May, the men's eight (with Sam at coxswain) went on to reclaim the title after a near 50-year wait in an exhilarating final by winning gold.

Off the water Sam has completed a Bachelor of Environmental Management and Planning through Lincoln University and is studying business and marketing at postgraduate level.