Yale sailors caught some good breaks and made a few bad mistakes on several New England waterways in various competition formats this weekend.
The No. 6 women’s sailing team finished third at the Regis Bowl on the Charles River, while the No. 6 coed team finished third at the Tufts-hosted Hood Trophy, a fifth at the White Trophy, eighth at the Chris Loder Trophy and 15th at the St. Mary’s Fall Intersectional.
The women’s team headed north to compete in the Regis Bowl hosted by Boston University. A division sailors Genoa Warner ’12 and Stephanie Schuyler ’12 won the final individual race to cap off a sixth place A division finish overall. Marlena Fauer ’14 and Eugenia Custo Greig ’14 dominated with five individual race victories and 12 top-fives that gave the pair an overall win in the B division.
“The first day was really shifty,” Custo Greig said. “We ended up catching a lot of [the wind shifts].”
The combined division scores put the women in third with 104 points — one point short of second-place Dartmouth.
At the Hood Trophy on Tuft’s Mystic Lake, Cameron Cullman ’12 and Blair Belling ’11 grabbed three first- and second-place race finishes, respectively, en route to a first place A division finish.
“Blair knows the boat so well, and she’s an All-American,” Cullman said. “I feel extremely fortunate that I get to sail with her right now.”
Sailors Rob Struckett ’12 and Isabel Elliman ’12 took home first place in the first and last races for a seventh place finish in the B division.
Two weeks ago, the Bulldogs seized the Harman Cup and an opportunity to compete in the New England Match Racing Championship. This event, known as the White Trophy, took place on the Thames River at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy on Saturday. Match racing is a new format in college sailing that pits one college against another in each event as opposed to other racing formats, which feature boats from multiple schools, said Joseph Morris ’12, who competed in the event along with Max Nickbarg ’14, Amanda Salvesen ’14 and Chris Segerblom ’14
“All three of the freshmen have experience in match racing,” Morris said of his three freshmen teammates.
The Elis worked together to win their first three races but made a critical error in their fourth against the Coast Guard Academy that reversed their momentum, Morris said.
“After that, we made big mistakes,” Morris said. “I think it was definitely a learning experience.”
The Bulldogs finished in fifth place by the end of competition Saturday, just missing out on qualification for Sunday’s four-team finals.
At the Chris Loder Trophy in New Hampshire, sailors Emily Billing ’13, Alexa Chu ’11, Tatyana Camejo ’11 and Nathan Stevens ’11 arrived Sunday to no breeze and a lot of wait time. But the wind picked up around noon, allowing for eight close races. The Bulldogs finish eighth overall.
Yale also finished ninth in the Salt Pond Invitational at the University of Rhode Island.
Next weekend, the Bulldogs coed team will send sailors to compete for the Danmark Trophy, the Smith Trophy and the Southern Series Three. The women’s team will be competing in the New England Women’s Singlehanded Championships in Vermont.