Caryn Davies (born April 14, 1982, in

Ithaca, New York Ithaca is a city in the Finger Lakes region of New York, United States. Situated on the southern shore of Cayuga Lake, Ithaca is the seat of Tompkins County and the largest community in the Ithaca metropolitan statistical area. It is named ...

) is an American

rower Rowing, sometimes called crew in the United States, is the sport of racing boats using oars. It differs from paddling sports in that rowing oars are attached to the boat using oarlocks, while paddles are not connected to the boat. Rowing is ...

. She won gold medals as the stroke seat in women's eight at the 2012 Summer Olympics and the 2008 Summer Olympics."Athlete Bio: Caryn Davies"
. USRowing. Retrieved June 24, 2012. In April 2015 Davies stroked

Oxford University Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to th ...

to victory in the first ever women's Oxford/Cambridge boat race held on the same stretch of the river Thames in London where the men's Oxford/Cambridge race has been held since 1829."English boating tradition modernized a bit by adding women"
''CBS News''. Charlie D'Agata. April 15, 2015. Retrieved April 18, 2015."Rowing’s Caryn Davies Goes Out In Style"
Team USA. April 15, 2015. Retrieved April 18, 2015."Caryn Davies to be part of history-making boat race"
''Ithaca Journal''. Tom Fleischman. April 1, 2015. Retrieved April 6, 2015. She was the most highly decorated Olympian to take part in either en's or women'srace."Boat Race 2015: Historic moment for Oxford and Cambridge at weigh-in for men's and women's crews"
''The Telegraph''. Rachel Quarrell. March 19, 2015. Retrieved March 22, 2015. In 2012 Davies was ranked number 4 in the world by the

International Rowing Federation World Rowing, also known as the World Rowing Federation (former abbreviation FISA; french: Fédération internationale des sociétés d'aviron), is the international governing body for rowing. Its current president is Jean-Christophe Rolland who ...

. At the

2004 Olympic Games The 2004 Summer Olympics ( el, Θερινοί Ολυμπιακοί Αγώνες 2004, ), officially the Games of the XXVIII Olympiad ( el, Αγώνες της 28ης Ολυμπιάδας, ) and also known as Athens 2004 ( el, Αθήνα 2004), ...

she won a silver medal in the women's eight. Davies has won more Olympic medals than any other U.S. oarswoman."Day 6 at the London Olympics: Gold for Davies '05 and Lofgren '09"
''The Harvard Crimson''. Alexander Koenig. August 2, 2012. Retrieved August 2, 2012. The 2008 U.S. women's eight, of which she was a part, was named FISA (

) crew of the year. Davies is from

, where she graduated from Ithaca High School, and rowed with the Cascadilla Boat Club. Davies was on the Radcliffe College ( Harvard) Crew Team and was a member on Radcliffe's 2003 NCAA champion Varsity 8, and overall team champion."Golden Girl at Full Power: Caryn Davies"
''Harvard Magazine''. Craig Lambert. July–August 2003. Retrieved June 24, 2012. In 2013, she was a visiting student at Pembroke College, Oxford, where she stroked the college men's eight to a victory in both

Torpids Torpids is one of two series of bumping races, a type of rowing race, held yearly at Oxford University; the other is Eights Week. Over 130 men's and women's crews race for their colleges in six men's divisions and five women's; almost 1,200 pa ...

(spring intercollegiate races) and the Oxford University

Summer Eights Eights Week, also known as Summer Eights, is a four-day regatta of bumps races which constitutes the University of Oxford's main intercollegiate rowing event of the year. The regatta takes place in May of each year, from the Wednesday to the ...

races (for the first time in Oxford rowing history)."ROWING: Olympic star helps Pembroke to victory"
''Oxford Mail''. May 31, 2013. Retrieved May 31, 2013. In 2013–14 Davies took up Polynesian outrigger canoeing in Hawaii, winning the State novice championship and placing 4th in the long-distance race na-wahine-o-ke-kai with her team from the Outrigger Canoe Club.
''Bora Bora Insider''. Roderick Page. September 21, 2014. Retrieved March 22, 2015. In 2013, she was inducted into the

New York Athletic Club The New York Athletic Club is a private social club and athletic club in New York state. Founded in 1868, the club has approximately 8,600 members and two facilities: the City House, located at 180 Central Park South in Manhattan, and Traver ...

Hall of Fame. She has served as a Vice President of the U.S. Olympians Association and as athletes' representative to the Board of

USRowing The United States Rowing Association, commonly known as USRowing, is the national governing body for the sport of Rowing in the United States. It serves to promote the sport on all levels of competition, including the selection and training of t ...

. Davies has a degree from

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...

(A.B. Psychology, 2005), a J.D. (Doctor of Law) from

Columbia Law School Columbia Law School (Columbia Law or CLS) is the law school of Columbia University, a private Ivy League university in New York City. Columbia Law is widely regarded as one of the most prestigious law schools in the world and has always ranked i ...

(2013) and an MBA from

(2015). Davies is the most decorated Harvard Olympian in any sport. During 2013–2014, Davies served as a clerk to Judge Richard Clifton of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in Honolulu, Hawaii. She is currently an attorney with

Goodwin Procter Goodwin Procter LLP is a global law firm. It is one of the largest law firms in the world as measured by revenue and consists of more than 1,800 lawyers across offices in Boston, Cambridge, Frankfurt, Munich, Hong Kong, London, Los Angeles, Luxemb ...

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut Massachusett_writing_systems.html" ;"title="nowiki/> məhswatʃəwiːsət.html" ;"title="Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət">Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət'' En ...

Early career

Davies was recruited into rowing at 12 years of age. She started rowing competitively a year later in Australia in 1996, at the

Friends' School Friends schools are institutions that provide an education based on the beliefs and testimonies of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers). This article is a list of schools currently or historically associated with the Society of Friends, reg ...

in Hobart. A local rowing club also recruited her into single sculling, where groups of teenagers launched off a beach into tidal estuarine waters. Within six months she was the Tasmanian under-15 single sculls champion. Returning from Australia she continued with Cascadilla Boat Club and the Ithaca High School rowing team. In 1998, as a 16-year-old she competed in the world's biggest rowing race, the

Head of the Charles The Head of the Charles Regatta, also known as HOCR, is a rowing head race held on the penultimate complete weekend of October (i.e., on the Friday that falls between the 16th and the 22nd of the month, and on the Saturday and Sunday immedia ...

in Boston. Because she had already placed in the top three in a junior race at the Canadian Henley the summer before the race, officials insisted on placing her, as the only junior, into the championship category of top senior international rowers; she put up a creditable performance by placing 16th. The following summer (1999) she made her first national team, coming second in the US junior eight in

Plovdiv, Bulgaria Plovdiv ( bg, Пловдив, ), is the second-largest city in Bulgaria, standing on the banks of the Maritsa river in the historical region of Thrace. It has a population of 346,893 and 675,000 in the greater metropolitan area. Plovdiv is the ...

, followed by a gold medal in a four at the junior world championships in

Zagreb, Croatia Zagreb ( , , , ) is the capital and largest city of Croatia. It is in the northwest of the country, along the Sava river, at the southern slopes of the Medvednica mountain. Zagreb stands near the international border between Croatia and Slov ...

, in 2000, the first gold medal ever by US Junior women. She also won the prestigious Stotesbury cup regatta and the Scholastic Rowing Association single sculls in both 1999 and 2000, and the USRowing Youth invitational in 2000, placing her as the top US junior female rower at the time she left high school. Caryn's brother Kenneth also represented the US as a junior rower, and well as rowing at

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to tea ...

, achieving the position of Commodore of the Cornell Crew in his senior year and receiving All Ivy Academic Honors for all four years.

College and world championships

Davies rowed for Harvard from 2001 to 2003, leading the team to an NCAA championship in 2003, and again in 2005, after taking a year off for the Olympics. She has again taken a year off from

to compete in 2012. Most national team training has been based in

Princeton, New Jersey Princeton is a municipality with a borough form of government in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It was established on January 1, 2013, through the consolidation of the Borough of Princeton and Princeton Township, both of whi ...

, where the US women's team shares a boathouse and a lake with

Princeton University Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...

, whereas winter training was based in San Diego. Davies has the ability to row starboard, port, or scull at an international level."Davies rows in Head of Charles"
''Boston Globe''. October 17, 2006. Retrieved June 24, 2012. At 6' 4" she was the tallest member of the U.S. Women's National Team. She was part of the U.S. Olympic women's eight that set a world record in the heat prior to a silver medal in the final in Athens, Greece. She was stroking the eight that repeated the feat in the World Cup in Lucerne in May 2012. As the most experienced oarsperson on the U.S. women's team she acted as a guiding figure: "Remember it's just like the World Championships – the same people doing the same thing – but with more flags.""Caryn Davies – Four Years Later"
Row2K. August 7, 2008. Retrieved June 24, 2012. As of 2019, Davies has won the C.R.A.S.H-Bs three times: first as a junior in 2000, next in the open category in 2005, and in 2019 (at a rowing age of 37), she again won the open category. She serves as the athlete demonstrating rowing technique in video for the Concept II rowing-machine. Davies also promotes youth fitness through

World Fit World Fit is a program of the United States Olympic Committee (USOC), and the United States Olympians and Paralympians Association (USOP) to promote physical fitness and the Olympic Games ideals to school children through kids fitness programs, ...

and gives inspirational talks to youth groups. Davies' hobbies include travel, sailing, downhill skiing, horseback riding, yoga, and ballroom dancing. In high school, she competed for several years in competitive downhill skiing, reaching a 7th place in giant slalom in New York State. As a senior at Harvard, she competed on the ballroom team.

Competitive history

International results

* 2012: Samsung World Rowing Cup II, Lucerne, women's eight, 1st, rowing stroke; world record (5:54.17 in the heat) no longer world record. * 2011: FISA World Championships, women's pair, 8th * 2011: FISA World Cup, Lucerne, women's eight, 1st * 2011: Henley Royal Regatta, won the

Princess Grace Challenge Cup The Princess Grace Challenge Cup is a rowing event for women's quadruple sculls at the annual Henley Royal Regatta on the Thames at Henley-on-Thames in England. It is open to female crews from all eligible rowing clubs. Two or more clubs may co ...

(women's quadruple sculls) * 2008: Olympic Games, Beijing, China, women's eight, 1st (rowing stroke) gold medal * 2008: FISA World Cup, Lucerne, women's eight, 1st * 2007: FISA World Championships, Munich, women's eight, 1st (rowing stroke) * 2006: FISA World Championships, Lake Dorney, UK, women's eight, 1st (rowing stroke) * 2006: FISA World Cup, Lucerne, women's eight, 2nd * 2006: Henley Royal Regatta, won Remenham Cup (women's eight) * 2005: FISA World Championships, women's quadruple sculls, 5th * 2005: Bearing Point World Cup, Munich, women's quadruple sculls, 3rd * 2004: Olympic Games, Athens, women's eight 2nd silver medal * 2004: FISA World Cup, Munich, women's eight 1st * 2004: FISA World Cup, Munich, women's pair 3rd * 2004: FISA World Cup, Lucerne, women's eight 1st * 2003: FISA World Championships, Milano, Italy, women's four without cox 1st * 2002: FISA World Championships, Seville, Spain, women's eight 1st

Junior international

* 2000: FISA Junior World Championships, Zagreb, Croatia, junior women's four without cox. 1st * 1999: FISA Junior World Championships, Plovdiv, Bulgaria, junior women's eight, 2nd

C.R.A.S.H.-Bs: World Indoor Rowing Championship

* 2019, C.R.A.S.H.-B. Indoor Sprints, women (open), 1st *2005, C.R.A.S.H.-B. Indoor Championships, women's collegiate open weight, 1st * 2000, C.R.A.S.H.-B. Indoor Championships, junior women, 1st"Crash B 2000"
''Rowing News''. February 2000. Retrieved June 24, 2012.

National results

* 2015: Stroked Oxford University women's eight to a win over Cambridge in the first ever Oxford/Cambridge Women's Boat Race on the River Thames

', BBC video of the 2015 Women's Oxford/Cambridge Boat Race, accessed May 20, 2017 * 2013: Stroked Oxford University women's eight to a win in the British University Rowing Championships * 2013: Stroked Pembroke College Oxford men's eight to wins in Oxford University Torpids and Summer Eights * 2006: Australian National Championships, women's senior A four, 2nd * 2006: Australian National Championships, women's senior A quadruple sculls, 3rd * 2005: Head of the Charles, women's double sculls, 1st * 2005: NCAA Championships, women's varsity eight, 3rd * 2003: NCAA Championships, women's varsity eight, 1st

Junior national

* 2000: USRowing Youth Invitational, junior women's single sculls champion * 2000: Scholastic Rowing Association of America women's single sculls champion * 2000: Stotesbury Regatta (juniors) women's single sculls champion * 1999: Scholastic Rowing Association of America women's single sculls champion * 1999: Stotesbury Regatta (juniors) women's single sculls champion * 1997: State of Tasmania (Australia) under 15 girls single sculls champion

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Davies, Caryn 1982 births Living people Sportspeople from Ithaca, New York American female rowers Radcliffe College alumni Columbia Law School alumni Alumni of Saïd Business School Olympic gold medalists for the United States in rowing Olympic silver medalists for the United States in rowing Harvard Crimson women's rowers Rowers at the 2004 Summer Olympics Rowers at the 2008 Summer Olympics Rowers at the 2012 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 2012 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 2008 Summer Olympics Medalists at the 2004 Summer Olympics World Rowing Championships medalists for the United States 21st-century American women Ithaca High School (Ithaca, New York) alumni People educated at The Friends' School, Hobart