The sailing teams were in action last weekend competing in several regattas along the east coast. The freshmen boats raced in the Freshman Atlantic Coast Championships at the U.S. Naval Academy, while the varsity team split up allowing several sailors to travel to Brown University in Rhode Island to compete in the Narragansett Bay Open, and others to stay closer to home racing in the Michael Horn Trophy hosted by Harvard.
The freshmen Jumbo sailors faced rough waters and a difficult field at the Naval Academy. The team felt it could have done better across the board, but ended up placing thirteenth overall out of the sixteen participating teams.
Freshman Michael Easton sailed to a 12th place finish with classmate Katie Greenlee in the A division. Had the duo not committed several technical errors along with some other mistakes, it probably would have fared better amongst its challenging opponents.
"The competition was unusually tough," Easton said. "[We also] just couldn't figure out how to sail [on those conditions]."
Boston College took the weekend's title with a score of 173 points, almost half of Tufts' 305 points.
Much like their A division teammates, first years Katie Storck and Lyndsey Gibbons-Neff finished 12th in their B division.
"We definitely could have done better," Gibbons-Neff said. "I don't think any team was consistently ahead. A few teams had a couple good races that helped. We would [have been] right next to BC, but they had some good races which set them apart."
While the freshmen were battling it out down south, some of the more experienced sailors competed in the Narragansett Bay Open co-hosted by Brown and Providence College.
Sophomore Jimmy Praley sailed the first eight races with junior Michaela Brady-Lederer for the A division. Juniors Zander Kirkland and Katie Mims sailed the latter six races and helped contribute to the overall fifth place finish in that division.
For the B division at Narragansett, Emily Randall sailed with Gretchen Curtis for the first eight races. Women's senior captain Lindsay Shanholt and freshman Chloe Starr competed in races nine through 14. Tufts took 11th in the B group.
The teams improved on Sunday at the Michael Horn Trophy, although the stiff winds made it difficult to know how to react in many situations. Tufts sent 12 teams to Harvard for the event. There were four divisions, with ten colleges vying for the trophy. The Jumbos grabbed fifth place, as Harvard took home the hardware.
Senior Kara Kelley and sophomore Emily Randall shared the regatta, with Kelley sailing the first six races and Randall taking the latter four. Sophomore Emma Creighton remained as crew for all ten races as the Jumbos took a sixth place finish in the A division.
"If we sailed more we could have done better," Creighton said after the team was only able to get four races in on Sunday. "Saturday was really windy. It was taking a really long time for them to run races."
The six races from Saturday and additional four on Sunday met the bare minimum of 10 races for an official regatta. Most regattas include more races, an aspect that would have helped Tufts.
The Jumbos didn't go into the regatta with their top boats, since they were sailing in an invitational regatta at Yale. According to Creighton, most of the other teams present sent their top sailors to this event.
Since Tufts is a considerably light-weight team, the heavy winds made it difficult for the sailors. Overall, Kopp felt that he and the team could have done better.
"Everyone was up and down; it wasn't our best regatta," Kopp said.
Tufts raced fairly well in the C and D divisions despite the winds. Junior Tommy Leach sailed with an alternating crew of senior Sarah Woodworth and freshman Bridget Belliveau in the C division where Tufts was able to lay claim to fourth place. Sophomores Jen Giroux and Mackenzie Rigin competed in the D division for the first six races, with Curtis in Rigin's place for the last four races with Giroux on Sunday.
The heavy winds made it a struggle for everyone on Sunday at Narragansett.
"We were working the whole time to keep ourselves from not ending up in the water," Curtis said. "We were able to stay relatively dry, though."
"People weren't as happy with their performance [in the Horn Trophy] as they could have been," Curtis said. "Sailing on the Charles is really difficult."
An invitational regatta, dubbed 'Snow and Satisfaction,' took place at Yale last weekend outside of the collegiate schedule. Two boats from Tufts and two from Yale were the only undergraduate sailors invited. A 2004 Olympian competed, along with several others who had tried out for their country's Olympic teams.
Tufts junior Dave Siegal sailed with a Boston University alumnus from 1999, Rich Bell. Junior Jumbo captain Jeff Cruise and freshman crew Chryssa Rask along with sophomore crew Anna Martin and Legler made up the Tufts contingent in the event.
"The cool thing is that we got to sail in waves up to six feet high," Legler said.
The Yale team held this invitational to provide intense and competitvie fun for experienced sailors and to allow its own team to practice against the best competition.
"They had the best possible competition for the Yale teams," Legler said.
