Renate Boesler

Renate Boesler, also referred to as Bösler and later as Gunkel, is a retired East German rower who won medals at European championships between 1963 and 1971. During that time, she became European Champion four times in two different boat classes.

Rowing career At the 1963 European Rowing Championships in Moscow, she won a silver medal in the coxed quad sculls event with a team from Berliner TSC. Since women's rowing had formally become a part of the European Rowing Championships in 1954, this was only the second time that East Germany had won this boat class (the previous occasion had been in 1960), with all other titles having gone to the Soviet Union. All East German teams stayed away from the 1965 European Rowing Championships held in Duisburg, West Germany.

At the 1967 European Rowing Championships in Vichy, Boesler competed with the women's eight and won a silver medal. At the 1968 European Rowing Championships in East Berlin, Boesler won a gold medal with the women's eight. Throughout her rowing career, she started for the Berliner TSC. She retired after the 1972 rowing season and was celebrated alongside other retiring international rowers in May 1973.

Awards

In December 1963, Boesler was given the honorary award Master of Sport alongside her four team mates from Berliner TSC. Three of the rowers of the women's eight who won European gold in 1968 and 1969 were awarded the Medal of Merit of the GDR in January 1970: Boesler, Ursula Pankraths, and Renate Schlenzig. In September 1970, six rowers of women's eight were awarded a Patriotic Order of Merit in bronze for winning three consecutive world championship titles since 1968: Gudrun Apelt, Barbara Behrend, Marita Berndt, Gabriele Rotermund, Renate Schlenzig , and Boesler.

Family Boesler is the aunt of sisters Petra and Martina Boesler. Both her nieces have won Olympic rowing medals. Some time between August 1971 and May 1973, Boesler married fellow international rower Wolfgang Gunkel.