Ben Dodwell

Benjamin Philip Dodwell (born 17 April 1972 in Melbourne) is an Australian former rower - a nine-time national champion, a triple Olympian, Olympic medal winner and representative at World Rowing Championships.

Club and state rowing Dodwell was educated at Melbourne Grammar School where he took up rowing. He rowed in the school's first VIII of 1988. Four years later he would be competing at the Barcelona Olympics. From school he joined the Mercantile Rowing Club in Melbourne. Later during his Australian representative period he would row from the UTS Haberfield Rowing Club in Sydney. In 1992 he was selected in the Victorian senior men's eight to race for the King's Cup at the Interstate Regatta. He raced in further King's Cup eights in 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1998, 1999 and 2000. He enjoyed a particular period of Victorian dominance winning every King's Cup he contested excepting 1999.

In 2010 Dodwell was inducted as a member of the Rowing Victoria Hall of Fame.

International representative rowing Dodwell's Australian representative debut was at the Barcelona Olympics in 1992 at aged twenty in his first year of senior club and state rowing. He rowed in the five seat of the Australian men's eight who made the Olympic final and finished in fifth place.

Dodwell took a representative break after Atlanta and then moved back into selection contention in 1998. Australia's prominent crew of the early nineties, the Oarsome Foursome were in their first year of a post Olympics comeback in 1998 and had moved into coxed boats. Together with Bo Hanson and the twins Geoff and James Stewart, Dodwell took seats in the Australian men's coxless four with their eyes on a 2000 Olympics campaign. They were up against the gun British foursome including Steve Redgrave and Matthew Pinsent. At the 1998 World Rowing Championships Dodwell and the Australian coxless four finished in fourth place. At the 1999 World Championships in St Catharines Canada, they won a silver medal behind Great Britain. The Australian's took bronze and Redgrave's fairytale five Olympic gold medal came true. It was a fitting final representative performance for Dodwell in his home country Olympics.