Yale Athletics
Both the coed and women sailing teams made waves across New England in four regattas this past weekend, ending Sunday with two first-place trophies.
Both victories went to the coed teams. The first team won the Fowle trophy at the New England Team Racing Championship hosted by Connecticut College — the Elis’ first nationals qualifier of the season. With a 14-4 record, the first team overtook second-place Boston College and third-place Dartmouth, while the second team clashed with Tufts and Roger Williams at the Mystic Lake Team Race at Tufts before eventually taking home the trophy. Coming off of a hot streak, the women’s team slumped to a midtable finish in the Emily Wick Trophy.
The first team improved immensely from last weekend’s finish at the 38th Lynne Marchiando Trophy regatta at MIT, hopping six spots from seventh to first place. Last year, the Bulldogs also grabbed the top spot at the team racing championship, finishing 15-3 while fighting shifty winds.
“The Fowle Trophy proved to be one of the most competitive qualifiers that our team has sailed in, in recent years,” crew Kira Woods ’19 said. “To qualify, we focused on starting well and sailing consistently. Weatherwise, we lucked out with two beautiful days of sailing in sunny temperatures into the 60s, quite the contrast to our Friday practice in near-freezing hail.”
The venue of the Mystic Lake Team Race was familiar to the Elis — last weekend, the Bulldogs also competed at Tufts, battling harsh winds to finish in fourth place in the Jumbo Team Race. Second-team member Anisha Arcot ’22 told the News that the weekend’s warmer weather was “amazing,” adding that the switch from heavy cold-weather dry suits to lighter gear uplifted team members heading into the weekend’s regattas.
The Mystic Lake Team Race marked the second squad’s last team race. While fleet races feature one Bulldog boat in a field of 18 competitors, team races pit three boats from one school against three boats from another, requiring greater tactical coordination between each Yale boat.
“This weekend was really fun, we got a ton of races both Saturday and Sunday, which isn’t always the case at Tufts because they tend to have very light winds,” Arcot said.
A younger squad of sailors traveled to URI, improving last week’s 13th-place finish at the Trophy Fleet Race to take a respectable seventh at the Southern Series 5.
Despite a stellar record so far this season, the women’s team took on water when it raced at Coast Guard for the Emily Wick Trophy. Despite three consecutive wins at their most recent regattas, the Elis sunk to a ninth-place finish out of 18 teams. While the Elis found themselves in the wake of opponents like MIT and Brown, they did manage to race ahead of schools like BU and Tufts, ending the day in the center of the scoreboard.
The women’s team will sail for the Reed Trophy at MIT on April 20–21. For this upcoming weekend, the coed teams will scatter across the eastern seaboard to race in four more regattas: the Thompson Team Race at Connecticut College, the Ivy Championships at home, the Oberg Trophy at MIT and the Central Series 4 at Tufts.
Valerie Pavilonis | valerie.pavilonis@yale.edu