March 10, 2009
The Navy intercollegiate sailing team had yet another busy, but successful, weekend, as it competed in four different events, one of which Navy hosted, and performed admirably, both in competition and in organization. Navy's most competitive event of the spring season so far came at the Graham Hall / John Jackson Team Race, which was co-hosted with Georgetown University. Of the 16 schools competing, 14 came in to the regatta ranked in the top 20 nationally, including seven of the top nine. Since Navy was the only team that had two intersectional team races scheduled and its top group was split amongst the two events, the Mids certainly had their work cut out for them. The team sailing at home pulled through though, advancing through the preliminary round at Navy and on to the championship at Georgetown, where it then advanced to the final four. The team of Martin Sterling, Timothy Murphy, Clark Hayes, Sara Burke, Caroline Lockett and Saverio Maldari came in fourth place overall and recorded victories over No. 1-ranked St. Mary's and No.-2 ranked Boston College along the way.
The other major team race Navy competed in this weekend was the Jeremy McIntyre Regatta at Stanford University, matching up against the best that the West Coast had to offer. In a hard fought event, Navy was able to claim the overall victory ahead of UC Irvine and Stanford. The team of Andrew Vann, Andrew Hotchkiss, Christina Chance, Maggie Boyle, Robert Vann and Juaquina Soland proved that their team racing knowledge and experience were too much for the speedy California teams to overcome. The fact that Navy can finished at or near the top at two major team race Intersectionals on the same weekend is a true testament to the depth on our team and the potential we have for this season and the future.
The Women's Team took the long van ride down to the College of Charleston to compete in their Women's Intersectional. The tricky winds and strong currents posed a serious challenge to the competitors as did the talented fleet that was assembled. Throughout the event, a large group of teams remained extremely close in the standings, with overall positions changing drastically after each race. In the end, Navy came in ninth out of 14 teams, with Trisha Kutkiewicz, Katherine Adler and Emily Taynor finishing 10th in A division while Tina Pryne and Theresa James were seventh in B.
The final event of the weekend was the ODU Spring Open, where Navy finished sixth out of 14 teams in attendance. The winds were extremely fickle on the first day and only one A division race was able to be completed. Sunday saw better conditions and six races total were completed per fleet. Mike Curran and Alice Hong finished seventh in A while Bobby Nordlund and Andy Kramer were sixth in B.
# GO NAVY #
