Redemption on the Charles: M. Lightweight Crew Tops Navy

It was 8:05 a.m. on Saturday morning, but the Navy varsity lightweights were done for the day. Their No. 1 national ranking had fallen just two hours after sunrise, before anybody was even awake to know about it.

Except, of course, for the celebratory Harvard crews on a cool-down row back to Newell Boathouse.

Paced by a blistering second 1,000 meters, the Harvard first varsity lightweights broke free from an early back-and-forth battle with the Midshipmen and sprinted to a near five-second victory.

The second varsity race was no less dramatic, with the Crimson overcoming a near-boat-length deficit to overtake the Navy crew with less than 500 meters to go. At the finish, Harvard held a commanding three-quarters boat lead.

Both Navy varsity boats entered the weekend ranked No. 1 in the U.S. Rowing national poll. The two Harvard varsity crews trailed them at No. 2.

But there would be little trailing on Saturday—and none at the finish line for the Crimson varsity.

“It was a good day for the Harvard varsity,” said senior first varsity seven-seat Michael Kummer. “[Navy] has a really fast program. It was great for Newell Boathouse to have the showing that it did.”

The two varsity wins were enough to ensure the squad of its first Haines Cup victory since 2001, when Harvard won the national title. The last time the Crimson claimed the Haines Cup, Harvard’s seniors were still in high school. Only one Harvard boat—the second varsity in 2004—had beaten Navy in a dual race in four years.

It had been a long time coming, and Harvard made sure to add a little open-water exclamation point to an already emphatic victory.

After Navy took a quick jump off of the start, the Crimson varsity found itself a few seats back on the country’s No. 1 crew. But Harvard again proved that the first 300 meters of the race have very little to do with the final 1,700.

“Both boats came out really hard off the start,” junior two-seat Wes Kauble said. “We both settled to pretty sustainable rhythms and from there our boat just concentrated on putting as much power as possible into every stroke.”

By 500 meters down, the two boats were locked in a near stalemate. Harvard’s surge after the start had matched it seat-for-seat with Navy, and neither boat seemed posed to make a strong move into the 1,000-meter mark.

Then both boats disappeared underneath the Mass Ave. bridge at the halfway point. For a few precious seconds, neither crew could see the opposition.

And once out from under the bridge, Harvard kept it that way.

The Crimson buried the Midshipmen in the second half of the race, with a gradual surge starting at 1,200 meters down that put the Harvard boat on the Navy bow ball with about 500 meters remaining.

“Right there in the middle of the piece, the seniors in our boat stepped up,” Kauble said. “They had wanted this race for a while, and I’m sure there was quite a bit of redemption that all of us were seeking from them.”

“It came to whether or not we were going to fight for the seniors and get them this win,” Kauble added, “and we were happy to be able to do that.”

Navy took up the stroke rating early in the final 500 to counter Harvard’s swelling advantage. Despite the push, the Crimson continued to increase its lead with a powerful sprint, crossing the line in 5:49.3. Navy finished in 5:54.0, with over half a length of open water separating the two crews.

The loss was the Navy varsity’s first since the spring of 2003 and shattered a 14-race winning streak.

“It was a pretty big statement,” Kummer said. “We just stayed calm within our boat and wanted to row well.”

The second varsity race began the same way as did the first and second freshman races, as the Navy boat pulled ahead by close to a boat length in the first 750 meters.

“Navy really tried to shake us off the start,” senior six-seat Nate Rogers said. “That’s sort of one of their trademarks. They had an unusually fast start and they took four seats in the first 20 strokes.”

The undefeated second varsity, arguably Harvard’s strongest in several years, looked vulnerable for the first time.

But the Crimson relied upon a strong, consistent base cadence and shrank the gap during the race’s middle 1,000 meters.

“From 1,250 [meters] left, we began this slow and steady assault,” Rogers said. “You need to stall your opponents’ move before you can start your own. Stop them first, then you go.”

Harvard went, and hard. After the Crimson pulled even with 400 meters to go, the second varsity stole all the momentum away from the Navy crew.

“It was very rewarding to have a crew come from behind from so long in the race,” said second varsity coxswain Felix Yu, “but we knew that we had the piece because we could keep our focus and keep pushing all the way.”

By the time the Crimson reached the finish line, it had matched Navy’s early six-to seven-seat lead. Over the course of the race’s final 1,200 meters, Harvard gained over 12 seats on the Midshipmen—equivalent to a five-second margin.

“At that point, we had the momentum,” Rogers said. “And we all committed to executing the sprint together. It was that moment, and we were like, ‘Let’s do this. Let’s just go.’”

The Crimson finished in 5:54.7—only 0.7 seconds off the time of the Navy first varsity boat—and Navy’s second varsity crossed in 5:57.5.

The two Harvard freshman boats and the third varsity all fell to the Midshipmen, who entered the weekend ranked No.1 in both freshman boats as well.

The two varsity wins, however, gave the Crimson the advantage for the Haines Cup.

The win puts the Harvard varsity at 7-1 on the season, and the second varsity is a perfect 8-0 going into next Saturday’s final dual meet against Princeton and Yale.

Next weekend on the Charles River, Harvard will put its new No. 1 ranking on the line.

“I think everyone was very pleased with yesterday’s performance,” Rogers said. “We just can’t afford to not to keep getting faster. Over the course of the season, it’s all about adding speed every week. If you’re not getting faster, you’re getting slower.”

But for this week, at least, the Crimson was plenty fast enough.

—Staff writer Aidan E. Tait can be reached at atait@fas.harvard.edu.