March 24, 2009
ANNAPOLIS, Md. -- After a few days off to enjoy Spring Break, the Navy Intercollegiate Sailing Team got back to work this past weekend with two regattas in Maryland. With no lengthy travel, the team was able to enjoy a productive joint practice on Friday with Roger Williams, Hobart William Smith and Tufts to shake off the rust before a challenging weekend, where the Mids sailed in two of the spring season's most competitive events.
The biggest event of the weekend was the biggest collegiate dinghy event of the year, the Truxton Umsted Intersectional, held at Navy. Assistant Coach Ted Huebner and his team of sailors did a fantastic job of getting quality races off even though the wind came out of a number of different directions during the event. Twenty of the best college sailing teams showed up in four divisions each and 68 total races were completed over the weekend for 17 per division. Navy's sailors who competed in the event performed admirably as well, finishing seventh overall. In every division, Navy enjoyed stretches of solid races and every boat on the water took its turn carrying the team. In the A Division, Andrew Vann and Christina Chance came on strong on Sunday afternoon to post fourth overall in a deep and talented fleet. Robert Vann and Juaquina Soland started strong and ended up eighth in B. Mac Fletcher moved up in the fleet on Sunday to finish ninth in C, while Martin Sterling sailed with great consistency early to finish sixth in D.
The other regatta of the weekend was the St. Mary's Women's Intersectional where 18 top women's teams converged on Southern Maryland for this always challenging event. St. Mary's was not as fortunate with the wind this weekend and the committee there struggled to get off nine races for each of the two divisions. The shifting winds and tough fleet proved a real challenge for the Navy sailors to figure out as the Mids ended up 16th for the weekend. Trisha Kutkiewicz and Emily Taynor wound up 18th in A while Tina Pryne and Theresa James were 10th in B.
# GO NAVY #
