Rower Johannes Thomas won a silver medal at the 1976 Montréal Olympics with the coxed fours. This crew had already won a gold and silver medal at the 1974 and 1975 World Championships, respectively. In 1972 he also won the East German national title in this class.
Thomas trained as a cook and studied gastronomy and hotel management. He then worked with Mitropa until re-unification. The company who managed sleeping and dining cars for railways in Germany was taken over after re-unification, but Thomas continued to work with them. His daughter Christina also became a rower, winning the Youth World Championships in 1997 with the coxed eights.
