Harvard Sailing Posts Strong Weekend Results

It was a busy weekend for the Harvard sailing team, with Crimson sailors competing at six regattas over two days. Although the difficulties of the team’s full racing schedule were further compounded by some tricky conditions, Harvard managed to secure a handful of solid finishes, highlighted by two top-three marks, in a weekend of mixed results.

“This was a cold, rainy weekend that made for some tough sailing conditions,” sophomore skipper Nick Karnovsky said. “While our score lines weren’t quite as strong as in our other regattas, we gained invaluable experience that will surely help us next weekend”

HARVARD INVITATIONAL

Harvard began the weekend in promising fashion with a top-ten result in its second and final home regatta of the fall season. Racing in FJs under cloudy skies, the Crimson ended up sixth of 12 teams.

The weather was overcast on the Charles River, but the wind was strong, and Harvard took advantage, as both the A and B boats cracked the top three in several races. A series of bottom-half finishes sank the team’s hopes of a top-five finish, however. In the end, crosstown rival Boston University edged Harvard out for fifth place by one point.

MYSTIC LAKE INVITATIONAL

The Crimson overcame a lack of wind to pick up its highest finish of the weekend at the one-day regatta hosted by Tufts. Sailing in Larks, Harvard posted 32 points to end up second out of eight teams, 12 points off of Tufts’ second entry and 20 points ahead of the Tufts first entry.

Relatively windless conditions meant that the fifth race of the day was cancelled, but the Crimson A duo of freshman skipper Jessica Williams and sophomore crew picked up a first place finish in the fourth race to ensure second place overall for Harvard. The race also saw the Crimson A boat finish first in points on the day.

REGIS BOWL

Harvard ended up on the winning side of some very tight margins to pick up a third-place result in the Boston University-hosted, all women’s regatta. The Crimson’s 130 points were just enough to see them past fourth-place University of Vermont on a tiebreaker, with Roger Williams and Rhode Island a mere one and three points behind, respectively.

Harvard was able to secure the result thanks to some strong sailing from the A boat of sophomore skipper Taylor Gavula and senior crew Emma Wheeler. The pair finished inside the top three in four of ten races, picking up two first-place marks along the way.

DANMARK TROPHY

The Crimson was unable to match its third-place result from last year in the two-day, bi-divisional regatta, hosted by Coast Guard, as the team finished the weekend 16th out of 20 programs. In the end, inconsistency and mistakes condemned Harvard to a bottom-half result.

The Crimson A boat of junior skipper Nick Sertl and sophomore crew Christine Gosioco picked up a handful of top-three finishes, including a win in the 10th race, but they were unable to consistently replicate their success. A number of results outside of the top 10, as well as a disqualification for the B boat of sophomore skipper Jackson Wagner and sophomore crew Catherine Tang sealed Harvard’s fate.

HEWITT TROPHY

Sailing in FJs, the Crimson fought through perhaps the most challenging, variable conditions of the weekend to pick up 155 points en-route to an eighth-place finish out of 15 schools at the in-conference, tri-divisional regatta hosted by Dartmouth.

“The breeze was really up and down in velocity, and the wind shifts were pretty unpredictable, so you had to be really mentally in it all day,” junior skipper Taylor Ladd said. “It was tough conditions and we learned a lot.”

Ladd and sophomore crew Kristin Anderson had an especially strong weekend in the B boat, notching a handful of top-five results to keep Harvard in a competitive position. In the end, Yale took top marks, with host Dartmouth and Coast guard more than 100 points behind in second and third, respectively.

GEORGE WARREN SMITH TROPHY

Led by a strong showing from its B boat, the Crimson sailed to a solid finish at the two-day, MIT-hosted regatta. Despite finishing behind a quartet of local rivals, Harvard capped a successful weekend on the Charles by ending up in fifth place out of 19 teams. Tufts, Brown, BU, and Northeastern, listed in order of finish, took the top four spots.

After a slow start, the Crimson B boat of sophomore skipper Andrew Puopolo and freshman crew Tancredi Castellano Pucci Di Barsento notched a string of competitive finishes to keep Harvard in top-five position. The duo did not finish outside of the first six places for eight races in a row, coming away with two victories along the way to help consolidate the team’s lead over sixth-place MIT.

–Staff writer Sam O.M. Christenfeld can be reached at schristenfeld@college.harvard.edu.