The winds blew in the favor of the coed sailing team this weekend.
Yale sailors participated in four regattas across the Northeast and finished strong at all of them. The coed team, coming off of a fourth place finish at the Southern New England team race March 23 and 24 in New London, finished fourth in the Boston Dinghy Club Cup.
The Dinghy Cup, hosted by Harvard and MIT, stretched over Saturday and Sunday and featured four divisions, or fleets, of boats instead of the normal two, forcing each participating team to field twice the normal number of sailors.
Kate Littlefield ’04, the coed captain, said the extra-large regatta was an opportunity for the team to showcase its depth.
“We got many of our skippers to sail in the cup,” Littlefield said. “[The regatta’s large size] worked to our advantage in that we have such a deep team.”
Sailors had to brave Saturday’s 20-30 knot winds and Sunday’s heavy rain, but in the end, fine performances in the A and B divisions made the difference for Yale. Stu McNay ’04 and Littlefield, his crew, placed second in A division, finishing in the top half in 13 of 16 races.
Brandon Wall ’03 and Meredith Killion ’05 were very successful in the B division, finishing third, only six points behind the second place Tufts team.
Yale boats in the other two divisions were less successful. Arthur Kinsolving ’03 and Jennifer Hoyle ’05 finished 10th in C division, and Eivind Karlsen ’06 and Benoit Bewley ’05 finished ninth in D division.
Harvard, which won the regatta, finished first in the A and B divisions, second in C and third in D.
“Harvard is one of the best, if not the best, sailing team in the country, and probably the deepest,” Littlefield said. “The fact that we did come in fourth represents a very strong performance on our part.”
The women’s team also sailed this weekend, but met with more difficulty. The women traveled to the 24th Women’s Joseph Duplin at Tufts, but a fourth place A division finish by Molly Carapiet ’06 and crew Courtney Cox ’06 was not enough for the team to finish higher than seventh in the 14-team regatta.
Grace McGeogh ’04 and crew Megan Pearl ’06 finished 11th in the B division at the Joseph Duplin.
“On Saturday, it was very windy, but I thought all of us hung in there very well and did our best,” Carapiet said. “Sunday was much lighter, but conditions were still difficult, and I think we sailed better.”
While Carapiet was sailing on Mystic Lake near Tufts, the Bulldogs hosted a regatta of their own: the Southern Series Two on Saturday. The Bulldogs finished third of eight teams.
Connecticut College’s A division boat and the University of Rhode Island’s B division boat dominated the race, capturing all but three first place finishes, and locking up first and second in the regatta for the Camels and the Rams, respectively.
The Bulldogs had mixed success but finished in the top four boats in all but three of the 16 races. Yale’s A and B division teams both finished third in their groups. In A division, Dana Worth ’04 sailed with crews Katie Baker ’05 and Anne Radecki ’05, while Eric Steinlauf ’05 and crew Laura Brenner ’05 sailed in the B division. Baker is a sports reporter for the Yale Daily News.
“It’s a tough regatta because it’s only one day,” Littlefield said. “You don’t have as many races as a two-day regatta, and there’s much less of a margin for error. It’s great that [Worth, Steinlauf, and their crews] did as well as they did.”
The weekend’s fourth regatta was the Veitor Trophy, held March 29 and 30 at Connecticut College in New London. It was at the Veitor the Elis ran into the most trouble, finishing 11th in a field of 16 teams. Ed Stewart ’03 and crews Natalie Kitchen ’05 and Andrew Schram ’06 sailed in the A division, and Eric Hayward ’04 and crew Nell Larsen ’05 sailed in B.
“I definitely think this was a successful weekend for the team,” Littlefield said. “It was absurdly windy in Boston this weekend, and we’re a light team. There were races where Stu [McNay] and I would come in third because the whole fleet would capsize. But I think we did really well.”
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