Sailing Posts Pair of Top-10 Finishes at Team Races

The Harvard sailing team competed in three separate regattas throughout the weekend en-route to posting top-ten finishes in both of the team racing events, while improving on previous years’ results in its divisional race.

ST. MARY’S TEAM RACE

The Crimson sent many of its veterans to Maryland to face off against non-conference, local area schools, and Ancient Eight competitors in the St. Mary’s Team Race, while racing in 420s and FJs in a true team round robin format.

The team of seniors Andrew Mollerus, Sydney Karnovsky, and Marek Zaleski, junior Julia Lord, junior co-captain Nomin-Erdene Jagdagdorj, and sophomore co-captain Nick Sertl posted a seventh place result in a field of ten with a 4-5 performance. Although the group tied sixth place Boston College in record, they lost the head-to-head matchup against the Eagles, thus establishing the final outcome.

“Our results weren't amazing, but the weekend gave us a lot of time to really learn from our mistakes, which will help us a lot in future weeks,” Karnovsky said.

Tentative winds prevailed throughout the weekend as the light breezes of 4-7 knots from the Northeast on both days were barely enough to get in the required 45 races to complete the round robin event.

WOOD TROPHY TEAM RACE

Hosting a team race event for the first time this season, this Harvard contingent of FJ sailors finished fifth place out of eight competitors with a 7-10 record overall throughout the two day event.

The weather on the Charles was far from consistent in both force and direction. Faltering gusts of varying strength ranging from one to 24 knots were the norm.

“The wind conditions were interesting with some lighter air in the morning and some pretty big gusts in the afternoon, but overall the direction of the breeze was steady with few large shifts,” freshman Nicholas DiGiovanni said. “[But] we were working well as a team and definitely learning a lot [from the conditions].”

On the crucial first day of the event, the coed group put forth a fifth place result against fellow NEISA competitors Boston College, URI, MIT, Brown, Penn, Boston University, and Fordham. The Crimson’s 6-8 effort on the day left it out of the Sunday double round-robin amongst Saturday’s top four finishers to determine the overall winner of the regatta.

“We did pretty well, certainly a tough competitor at the regatta,” DiGiovanni said. “We lost a few races we should have won and won a few we probably should have lost, so there were some curveballs throughout the day. I’d say we landed bit below our mark by the end of the day, but it was a good day of racing.”

Even though it was left out of the top-tier event, the group was able to finish on top of the single-round robin racing amongst the rest of the event’s participants on Sunday. After racing was completed, Boston College was able to triumph over URI in a tiebreaker as Harvard placed between fellow Ivy League squads, Brown and Penn, in the standings.

NAVY REGATTA

Unfortunately for this group of women racing FJs and Z420s in the Navy Spring Women’s Regatta in Annapolis, Md., the weather did not cooperate enough to get in all of the required racing. With the schedule shortened to only five races for each division of the women’s only interconference regatta, the Crimson strung together a 13th place finish in the 19 school field.

Having already forgone racing on Saturday due to the lack of wind, the analogous lack of racing on Sunday morning frustrated the sailors. But as soon as the wind began to pick up in the early afternoon, the women set out as quickly as possible to finish as many races as they could before the 3pm deadline. Only five races for each division were able to get off as Harvard’s A-Division crew posted 66 points to the B-Division crew’s 48.

With fellow sophomores, skipper Taylor Ladd and crew Kirstin Anderson, racing in the A-Division and fellow freshmen, skipper Taylor Gavula and crew Divya Arya, in the B-Division, the Crimson was able to improve on its 18th place result from just one year prior by totaling 114 points over the ten races. Rival Yale was the winner on the day as it finished with a well-balanced, 42-point performance in the shortened event.

“Unfortunately there was not much wind in Maryland this weekend so the teams at St. Mary's and Navy didn't get to sail much,” Karnovsky said. “However I think that when both teams did get out, we shook a lot of rust off and fine tuned a lot.”

–Staff writer Jackson M. Reynolds can be reached at jacksonreynolds@college.harvard.edu.