ANNAPOLIS, Md. – The Navy intercollegiate sailing team competed in three events this past weekend, which was highlighted by the Midshipmen advancing to the Women's Showcase Final following a fourth-place finish at their first showcase event of the season.
 
After competing in conference events over the first three weeks of the season, the Midshipmen had its first interconference regatta at the women's showcase. The first round of the women's showcase, which is seeded into two even regattas where the top nine teams from each regatta move onto the showcase final. In the first round of the showcase, the Midshipmen were seeded into the 16-team regatta at Connecticut College. The Thames River is a tricky place to sail and this weekend saw puffy and shifty winds, along with a strong current, which created challenges for the fleet. Despite the tricky sailing conditions, the weather featured temperatures in the 70s and wind ranging from 8-20 knots.
 
It took Navy a couple of races to gets used to the conditions and the fleet, which resulted in inconsistent finishes in the early portion of the event. The Midshipmen got more comfortable in the event as the regatta wore on and they started to post top finishes consistently late on Saturday and all day on Sunday to continue to move up the leaderboard. Navy placed fourth overall to advance to the finals of the showcase on October 12-13 at the Jen Harris Regatta in Annapolis. Olivia de Olazarra, Madeline Pruzan and Anna Cutler placed sixth in the A division, while Brittney Slook and Kelly Milliken placed second in the B division.
 
Navy's lone conference event of the weekend was the MAISA Match Race Championship for the Intrepid Trophy, which was the final qualifier for fall nationals and eight teams were selected to compete at this year's Intrepid Trophy. Match racing offered a change of pace for the Midshipmen with keelboats and spinnakers being used in match racing. The weather cooperated during the weekend with a breeze of 10-15 knots from the south, which helped the fleet finish all of the round-robin racing in one day. 
 
After losing their first two races, the Midshipmen got better as the event went on and started a winning streak to put them on the verge of advancing to the finals. However, in the last race of the round-robin with a berth to the semifinals on the line, Navy led the host US Merchant Marine Academy around the final mark and looked strong heading into the finish but USMMA edged ahead of Navy at the final second to steal the race and the final spot in the semifinals. The Midshipmen's team included Nicholas Gartner, Jack Carminati, Kimmie Leonard and Gray Benson. Navy finished fifth overall with a record of 3-4.
 
The final event of the weekend for Navy was at the Danmark Trophy where 20 teams competed. The conditions for this event were similar to that of the women's showcase as both events took place near each other on the Thames River. With a challenging fleet and tricky conditions, consistency was hard to find throughout the fleet and Navy was one of the teams with up and down results. The Midshipmen were able to put together strong winning streaks in both divisions to finish fourth overall, just missing the top three. JC Hermus, Sally Johnson and Jonah Hatt finished fourth in the A division and Connor Bayless, Fiona Lobon and Sean Linden were sixth in the B division.
 
This coming weekend, Navy hosts the Truxtun Umstead Coed Showcase and also travels to Washington, D.C., for the Tom Curtis Regatta.