W. Crew Outraces Yale

The Radcliffe crew team left Yale paddling in its wake on the Charles River Saturday. The women's varsity eight finished at 7:07.5, 16 seconds ahead of its opponents in blue, who crossed the finish line in 7:23.4.

Radcliffe rowed powerfully from the start, immediately pulling ahead of Yale. The oarswomen held the lead for the first 1000 meters before breaking the race open with a power piece at the 1000-meter mark. Yale was not expected to have a strong team, but the victory means a lot to Radcliffe.

"We were nervous," stroke Carrie Edwards said. "We heard that Yale was not as strong this year, but we've had races before where we weren't expecting much and got unpleasant surprises. We took this race seriously and it went really well."

Radcliffe has lost only one race so far, to Princeton by two seconds.

"We were rowing less aggressively in the race against Princeton than the way we've been rowing in the last few weeks," Edwards said. "We've come a long way as a boat since then and we definitely have the power to take them at Eastern Sprints."

Before having the opportunity to avenge their loss to the Tigers, the women must prove themselves against B.U. next Tuesday. B.U. has "won everything in sight" according to Edwards. The Terriers beat Radcliffe by several seconds at the Head of the Charles last fall and won the crew classic in San Diego this spring. On Saturday, while Radcliffe finished in 7:07.7, B.U. raced the same course within minutes of the Radcliffe race, and finished in 7:07.5.

"The stage is set," Edwards said. "I think we can do it."

This is the first time in four years that the Radcliffe junior varsity boat has been able to out-row arch-rival Yale, and it did so with class on Saturday. Radcliffe crossed the line in 7:17.8, defeating Yale by an enormous margin of 28 seconds.

Radcliffe went up seven seats at the start and continued to pull away the rest of the race.

"We were aware that they were pretty far behind, but we couldn't slack off at all," sophomore Diane Henry said. "We just concentrated on future races and pulled really hard. We knew we had to win by a lot to prove that we're a legitimate crew."

The junior varsity boat has had an impressive season so far, losing only one race, its second of the season, to Brown. But it will get an opportunity to race Brown again at Eastern Sprints in the second week of May.

"We've really improved and we'll make it a good race against Brown at Easterns," Henry said