Oct 23, 2020 @ 07:50:39 EDT
Today was the first day of racing for the LaserPerformance Team Race National Championship on North San Diego Bay co-hosted by San Diego Yacht Club and the Pacific Coast Collegiate Sailing Conference. Sixteen collegiate teams from across the nation qualified to compete in this event for the national title and the Walter C. Wood Trophy, awarded to the winning team.
The boats hit the water around 10:30 a.m., but due to light winds the racing got sort of a slow start. The May Gray, typical of San Diego, lingered all day, so the skies stayed cloudy and temperatures hovered around the low 60s. The winds were out of the west, southwest starting out light around 5-7 knots building to around 8-10 knots for a period of time and tapering off again as the sun set on racing this evening.
The format for this event is a series of round robins. In the first round all sixteen teams race each other once. This round determines places 9-14. The top eight teams then advance to a single round robin, which determines places 5-8. The top four remaining teams advance to a “final four” another single round to determine places 1-4.
The competitors made it through a total of 84 races today and there are 36 more total races to go in this first round. The competitors sailed on a digital N course, which has a windward mark, a windward offset mark rounded to starboard and then down to a leeward mark with another leeward offset rounded to port and finish upwind. The N course allows for long upwind and downwind legs
Racing continued today in the LaserPerformance Team Race National Championship on North San Diego Bay, co-hosted by San Diego Yacht Club and the Pacific Coast Collegiate Sailing Conference. The top sixteen collegiate team racing teams in the nation are vying for the national title and the Walter C. Wood Trophy.
The winds were out of the west at around 5-8 knots for most of the day and temperatures stayed in the mid to high 60s. Due to holiday boat traffic the conditions also included choppy and lumpy water.
The first round, with all 16 teams, was completed today. There were 36 races left in the round and places 9-16 were determined as well as the top eight teams, who advanced to the next round of racing. Sailors are competing in FJs on a digital N course. The scores from each round of racing carry over to the next.
A sail off between Dartmouth College and Brown University, Brown and Old Dominion University and Dartmouth and Old Dominion took place at the end of the first round to break ties and determine who would advance to the top 8. Each team won a race and lost a race, but once the total wins, losses and points were calculated, Brown and Dartmouth advanced to the round of 8 teams and Old Dominion just missed out.
First Round Robin Results (wins and losses)
1. Yale University, 14-1 2. Boston College, 13-2 3. St. Mary’s College of Maryland, 13-2* 4. Georgetown University, 11-4* 5. College of Charleston, 11-4 6. Stanford University, 10-5 7. Dartmouth College, 8-7 b 8. Old Dominion University c 9. Brown University d 10. U.S. Naval Academy, 7-8 11. University of California at Santa Barbara, 6-9 12. Eckerd College, 5-10 13. Texas A&M University at Galveston, 2-13** 14. University of Michigan, 2-13 b 15. University of Wisconsin, 2-13 c 16. University of Washington, 0-15
*Tie stands
*Total points scored when tied teams met (18) b Total points scored when tied teams met (21) c Total points scored when tied teams met (24)
Top 8 racing got underway around 4 p.m. and wrapped up around 5 p.m. Nine races were completed in the second round today with 19 more to go. The winds in the afternoon were so light with the choppy water that the race committee called the racing earlier than they had anticipated for the day.
Yale University, the defending champion of the event, continues to hold onto their lead from yesterday with only one loss that they suffered in the preliminary round to St. Mary’s College of Maryland.
“It is unbelievably tight competition for the final four,” says Bill Healy, assistant coach for Yale. “We struggled in every race today, especially in the first half of our races
Today was the third and final day of the LaserPerformance Team Race National Championship on North San Diego Bay. This event is the second of three collegiate sailing national championships co-hosted by San Diego Yacht Club and the Pacific Coast Collegiate Sailing Conference this spring. After three days of racing Yale University is the national champion and winner of the Walter C. Wood Trophy for the fourth year in a row.
The day began with completing the top eight round robin. Racing got underway around 10:30 a.m. Competitors sailed in FJs on digital N courses for the top eight and final four rounds. The remaining 19 races were completed in the top eight round today. The conditions were cloudy with light winds to start the day from the west northwest and the winds picked up a bit in the afternoon around 12 knots under sunny skies. Temperatures stayed in the mid to high 60s.
The race officials kept the races going and by about 2:30 p.m. the competitors were into the final four racing. The final four was completed around 3:30 p.m. and a total of 157 races were completed in the event.
Today the teams were fighting to advance into the final four round. Due to the competitiveness of each team in this event, no one went through undefeated. Yale finished the top eight round with two losses, Boston College with four, Georgetown University with one and St. Mary’s College of Maryland with three. Going into the final four any one of the four teams had a chance at winning the regatta. However, after Yale won their second race against St. Mary’s, they clinched the regatta.
This is Yale’s fourth team race national championship title and Walter C. Wood Trophy win in a row. The last team to win four in a row was Tufts University in 1996.
“We are stoked,” says Bill Healy, assistant coach for Yale University, “Everyone sailed well and kept their heads on through the whole regatta.”
“Every race was tough and all of the competition was really good,” Healy says. “We were able to execute really well at the bottom mark on the course.”
Everyone on the Yale team will be returning next year, except for senior Charlotte Belling, who was on each of the four winning teams during her college sailing career.
The winning team members are Ian Barrows '17, Meredith Megarry '17, Malcolm Lamphere '18, Chandler Gregoire '17, Nicholas Baird '19, Charlotte Belling '16, Clara Robertson '17 and Joseph Kiss '17.
There were six total races scheduled in the final four, however in the first race of the round between Georgetown and St. Mary’s one of the tiller extensions in a St. Mary’s boat broke and they went from winning the race to losing it, so they were allowed a re-sail. Therefore seven races took place and St. Mary’s took the win. This meant that they displaced Boston College and took third overall while Georgetown clenched second place after beating Yale in the last race of the final four.
“Yale was tremendous and the best team won,” says Mike Callahan, head coach for Georgetown. “We had a lot of opportunities in the races that we lost, but we didn’t do it. We did have the best record in the final four, and that felt good,” he says.
Georgetown will graduate four seniors from their team race team this year.
Sailing for Georgetown was Sean Golden '16, Isabelle Ruiz De Luzuriaga '16, Nevin Snow '16, Meaghan MacRae '18, AJ Reiter '17 and Bettina Redway '16.
St. Mary’s winning their re-sail with Georgetown allowed them the last podium spot.
“We are really happy to be on the podium,” says Bill Ward, director of sailing for St. Mary’s. “All of our races were really close and we made some mistakes. It has been a long season and this was a good way to finish up considering where we came from.”
Sailing for St. Mary’s was Alexander Curtiss '16, Shelby Jacobs '17, Edmund Cooper '17, Mariah Leffingwell '16, Markus Edegran '16 and Kaitlyn Noreen '16.
Final Results, Top 8 (wins and losses) 1. Yale University, 21-4 2. Georgetown University, 19-6 3. St. Mary’s College of Maryland, 18-7 4. Boston College, 17-8
5. College of Charleston, 15-7 6. Stanford University, 13-9 7. Dartmouth College, 11-11 8. Brown University, 8-14
