'Cliffe Crew Streaks to Sprints Crown

In a weekend when the Harvard heavy and lightweight crews were wallowing to lackluster finishes in Lake Quin-sigamond's Sprints action, the Radcliffe crew powered unmolested through a field of ten schools yesterday to win the NEAWRC Women's Sprint title and grab the top ranking spot in Eastern women's rowing.

The 'Cliffe eight, obviously miffed at the Sprints Committee's decision to seed Princeton first, completely dominated the eights competition in yesterday's regatta on the Charles River Basin After destroying the competition in the morning heats with a very fast 4:08 clocking and a 14-second spread against a blustery 20 m.p.h. headwind, Radcliffe pulled away in the second 500 meters of the finals to win the title by open water.

Radcliffe covered the 1000-meter course in a remarkable clocking of four minutes flat, finishing 5.1 seconds ahead of runner-up Connecticut College. Williams, which set the pace for the first 500 meters and led for most of the first half, finished third, one second astern Conn College at 4:06.

"They rowed an extremely intelligent and sophisticated race," an ebullient John Baker said of his Radcliffe squad after the contest. "We were nip and tuck with Williams the first half, but we didn't break under the pressure of a close race and moved out steadily in the last 500," the coach added.

Radcliffe, which has been plagued by horrendous starts the last couple of weeks, got a good jump at the beginning of the race. Williams came out a little ahead, of everyone else, but Radcliffe was tight with the rest of the pack. Despite the good start, the 'Cliffe with the stiff headwind keeping the pack together, didn't take the lead until the 500-meter mark.

The biggest surprise of the race was the total collapse of first-ranked Princeton. The Nassau eight, on the strength of its undefeated record and one-second win over Radcliffe, had been given the top seed. But the Princeton women never got untracked, finishing the morning trials in a lackluster time of 4:20.9 and limping home fourth in the finals at 4:15.8.

"I was floored; it was amazing to beat Princeton by more than a length of open water," Baker said afterwards. In the morning I couldn't believe that we finished with a 4:08 and they had a 4:20, but that was just about right, as things turned out."

In fours, Radcliffe was unable to match the superb showing of the eights. After breezing into the finals with a 10-second win over Wellesley, the winds of fate shifted against the Cliffe quartet. At the start of the fours finals, Radcliffe jumped out to a quick lead only to have an oar jump its oar lock. The mishap forced the race to be called back for a second start.

In the replay, Radcliffe wasn't so lucky. A surprising Boston University boat, sneaked out to an early lead and made it stand up over 1000 meters, winning by a full ten seconds. Radcliffe, which never really recovered from the first-start foul up, ran second for most of the race, before being edged out by a fast-charging MIT boat by a stroke at the finish. B.U. was timed at 5:02. Radcliffe finished at 5:12.5.