David McGowan (born 27 April 1981) is an Australian high-performance rowing coach and former representative rower. As a rower he was a junior world champion, competed twice at senior World Rowing Championships for Australia and raced at the Athens 2004 Summer Olympics in a coxless four. As a coach he has had head coaching roles in the national rowing programmes of The Netherlands and Ireland. Club and state rowing McGowan contested three sweep events as a junior at the 1999 Australian Rowing Championships rowing for the Swan River Rowing Club. The following year he contested two U23 events. At the 2002 Australian Rowing Championships he raced for the open men's coxless four title in a WA composite crew and placed second. McGowan was first selected to represent Western Australia in 1999 in the men's youth eight at the Interstate Regatta within the Australian Rowing Championships. In 2000 he again raced in the WA youth eight when they won the Noel Wilkinson Trophy at the Interstate Regatta. In 2003 he was selected in the bow seat of the West Australian men's senior eight to contest the King's Cup at the Interstate Regatta. That WA crew was narrowly beaten by Victoria. In 2004 he again rowed in the West Australian King's Cup eight. International representative rowing McGowan made his Australian representative debut in 1999 in a men's four which won the junior world title at the Junior World Rowing Championships in Plovdiv, Bulgaria setting what was then a world's best time at the junior level. The following year he was selected in an Australian four for the World Rowing U23 Championships held in Copenhagen. They rowed to a silver medal. McGowan moved into the Australian senior squad in 2003. He rowed in the Australian men's eight at a World Rowing Cup and at the 2003 World Rowing Championships where they finished in fifth place. McGowan earned a seat in the Australian coxless four in 2005. They placed fourth at a World Rowing Cup in the Olympic lead-up and then at Athens 2004 they won their heat, placed second in their semi-final and finished in fourth place in the Olympic final. McGowan came back into Australian representative contention in 2006. He was back in the bow seat of the Australian eight for the World Rowing Cup II at Poznan where the eight took gold but two months later at the 2006 World Rowing