Yale Athletics
The Yale sailing team saw mixed results on the water this past weekend, with Louisa Nordstrom ’20 taking gold in the women’s singlehanded conference championship, while Nic Baird ’19 had to settle for 5th in the men’s competition, one spot outside of qualification for the national championship.
The women’s sailing team also traveled to Boston University for the Regis Trophy, where the squad of four sailors placed 12th, and six additional athletes representing the coed team finished fourth at the Hatch Brown Trophy, hosted by MIT. Coed sailing also sent a team of four to Boston for the Tufts Invite, where unfavorable weather conditions meant the race was called off.
At the men’s singlehanded conference championship this past weekend, Baird racked up 75 points, eight points short of fourth place and a berth at the national championship. It was the first time in his collegiate career that he failed to qualify for the national championship.
“It was a tough weekend,” Baird said. “I sailed about at my worst so it’s good to be reminded of the weaknesses that I need to keep working on.”
At the Hatch Brown Trophy, hosted by MIT, a dense fog and lack of wind on Saturday made racing impossible, and the three divisions were each able to complete only three races on Sunday.
Yale was represented in the A, B and C divisions by skipper Shawn Harvey ’21 and crew Claudia Loiacono ’21, by skipper Nick Marwell ’21 and crew Kira Woods ’19, and by skipper Dylan DiMarchi ’20 and crew Catherine Webb ’22, respectively. Overall, the squad of six finished fourth in a field of 17.
“This weekend had no wind,” coed team captain Nick Hernandez ’19 said. “In those conditions, it’s virtually impossible to guarantee success, so it was promising to see that our team was still able to perform well. At the Hatch Brown [Trophy], there were only three races, which is not a good representation of any sailor’s skill level. Anyone can get lucky for three races, which is why regattas tend to have as many races as possible.”
Nordstrom edged out 10 other competitors for the top spot at the women’s singlehanded conference championships, hosted by Boston College, qualifying for the national women’s singlehanded championship for the second time in her career. The Sarasota, Florida native’s 42-point total led an incredibly competitive field; the top three finishers at the regatta all finished within three points of one another.
Chrissie Klingler ’20 also competed in the event, where she placed ninth with 76 points across 11 races. Both she and Nordstrom faced tricky upwind sections of the race course caused by subpar wind conditions.
“This weekend I was super happy with my boat speed,” Nordstrom said. “The conditions were pretty light and there was a lot of current, so being fast was really helpful. Large current differences across the course also made strategy pretty difficult when it came to choosing a side, but I was luckily able to get a pretty good handle on that throughout the regatta. Overall though, points were super tight for most of the regatta, so I was really happy I was able to maintain my lead.”
The team of four sailors representing Yale at the Regis Trophy, held at Boston University, contended with similar weather issues. Racing only commenced Saturday afternoon, when the regatta committee determined that the wind was finally strong enough, and the sailors were only able to complete five races in each division across both days of competition. In the A division, skipper Eme Wallace ’21 and crew Meredith Ryan ’22 represented Yale on the first day of competition, while Sonia Lingos-Utley ’21 skippered with crew Cate Mollerus ’21 on the second day of the regatta. In the B division, skipper Anisha Arcot ’22 raced with crews Loiacono and Ryan on the first and second days, respectively. The team of four finished the regatta with 103 points, placing 12th overall.
The women’s team heads to Dartmouth this coming weekend, while the coed team scatters to Tufts, Brown and the University of Rhode Island.
Raymond Gao | raymond.gao@yale.edu