Harvard Comes up Short on Charles

It was a rather disappointing and uneventful two days for the Harvard sailing team this past weekend out on the Charles River, as the Crimson competed in some of the trickiest conditions of its spring season.

While the women’s squad did not compete over the weekend, the co-ed squad’s top sailors took part in the Marchiando/Friis Trophy Team Race while other members of the team competed in the Central Series Four regatta, both contested in Cambridge.

It was Harvard’s most limited action in three weeks, and the regattas represented the end of team racing for the co-ed squad for the next several weeks until the championship portion of the schedule begins in May.

“We had a lot of trouble this weekend,” junior crew Michelle Konstadt said. “We really should not have had so much trouble, as we were sailing on our home water. However, northwest winds on the Charles are some of the toughest conditions we will face all year.”

MARCHIANDO/FRIIS TROPHY TEAM RACE

Harvard’s co-ed squad finished a disappointing eighth out of eight teams over the weekend in the Marchiando/Friis Trophy Team Race hosted by Tufts University. While the Crimson came out fairly strong on day one of the two-day affair, with two victories over the College of Charleston, earning a trip to the gold fleet of competition for day two, Harvard went winless on Sunday.

“We had a good Saturday,” Konstadt said. “But we were really disappointed with the way things went on Sunday.”

Boston College took home the team trophy from the two days of competition, with six other notable east coast collegiate sailing programs also ahead of the Crimson.

While Harvard’s regulars competed in this regatta over the weekend, the Crimson tinkered a bit with its lineups due to the difficult conditions it faced out on the water.

“We mixed it up with most of our pairings,” Konstadt said. “We have four good skippers, but only three can compete at a time, so they are constantly rotating. We were forced to make these slight modifications due to the northwest winds.”

Sophomore captain skipper Alan Palmer teamed up with senior crew Lauren Brants for the entire weekend. Other than that combination, the lineups were thoroughly mixed for Harvard throughout the two days of contests. Senior Jon Garrity, sophomore John Stokes, and sophomore Teddy Himler skippered for the Crimson in the team racing competition, while sophomore Grace Charles, sophomore Quincy Bock, junior Winston Yan, and Konstadt shared time at crew.

Although Harvard’s sailors were less than satisfied their results from the weekend, the squad did learn valuable lessons heading into the fleet racing portion of their schedule next weekend.

“We have really awesome coaching and I think we will get to sail the boats faster next weekend during our fleet races,” Konstadt said. “We need to work on going faster, as can be seen from this past weekend, so I think it is a good time for us to compete in fleet competitions.”

CENTRAL SERIES FOUR REGATTA

The Crimson co-ed squad also sent a contingent to compete at the local Central Series Four regatta on the Charles, a one-day event hosted by Harvard over the weekend. The Crimson took home fifth place out of a field of eight teams, with sophomore skipper Matt Donelan and freshman crew Will White, who is also a Crimson news writer, teaming up in the A boat. Junior skipper Mark Rinaldi and freshman crew Alex Jumper competed in the B boat for Harvard. The Jumbos from Tufts University took home the team trophy from the Saturday contest.

While Harvard might not face other colleges’ top sailors at Central Series events, the Crimson still considers the competitions great opportunities to race local New England squads.

“The Central Series regattas provide a great opportunity to race a bunch of other teams without having to travel too far,” Jumper said. It was pretty rainy and windy out on the Charles this weekend, and we had to wait for the crew regatta to finish up, but it was nice to be sailing at home and with some different lineups than usual.”

—Staff writer Thomas D. Hutchison can be reached at tdhutch@fas.harvard.edu.