Devlin Qualifies for National Championships

Yale freshman Jane Macky led the field early this weekend at the New England women’s singlehanded qualifying regatta, but in the fifth race it seemed Macky hadn’t quite yet paid her dues.

Macky finished a disastrous 17th in the set, opening the field to last year’s national women’s singlehanded runner-up, Harvard co-captain Sloan Devlin. While Macky—the younger sister of New Zealand’s Olympic representative in the singlehanded Europe class—gave Devlin a run for her money, age and experience won out, as Devlin won the regional championship to qualify for nationals.

Yet the race came down to the line.

“Because the point set was really large at that point for the last four races, I started paying more attention to where she was on the course,” Devlin said. “My mindset changed over the last four races.”

Devlin, Macky, Yale senior Molly Carapiet, and Bulldogs junior Emily Hill finished in the first- through fourth-places, respectively, to qualify for the ICSA women’s singlehanded national championships, to be held in Hawaii with the men’s singlehandeds in late November.

“Molly and Emily, who got third and fourth, they are the two skippers who won the national championship for Yale two years ago. They’re really strong sailors and consistently do really well,” Devlin said.

Devlin and Macky were a cut above, as 39 points separated Macky from her third-place teammate. Three of the top four skippers hailed from Yale.

Last year, the Crimson qualified two sailors for nationals, Devlin and Genny Tulloch ’05.

Harvard senior Jessica Baker finished 11th, while freshman Roberta Steele followed her in 12th.

With the team entering a series of major intersectional regattas both for co-eds and women, Devlin and the three men’s sailors who will sail at New England qualifiers—senior Vincent Porter, junior Clay Johnson, and sophomore Kyle Kovacs—will be splitting time between fleet and singlehanded racing.

HOOD TROPHY @ TUFTS

A blowout performance by BC’s B-division earned the Eagles first at the Hood Trophy, held this weekend at Tufts.

Boston College (BC) freshman skipper Adam Roberts and junior crew Allie Whitehead won six races and finished 10 of 14 in the top three to total 36 points in the B-division, leading by far next-place Yale, which had 82. Despite a sixth-place finish in the A-division, BC won the regatta, as Harvard placed third.

Johnson, skippering, and crew Kristen Lynch placed third in the A-division, while Porter and senior crew Ruth Schlitz finished a handful of sets out of the top 10 to slip to fourth place in the B-division.

Excepting Princeton, the entire Ivy League sailed in the regatta, a rare occurrence as the schools are in different sections. Harvard’s most dangerous competition comes from a few other Ivy League schools in New England—Brown, Dartmouth, and Yale—and from other schools like BC or Hobart/William Smith.

HARVARD INVITE

The Crimson launched its younger sailors into the tricky winds that occasionally sweep the Charles River on Saturday. Harvard sailed effectively two teams, racing two boats in both A- and B-divisions.

Harvard’s first pair of boats won the regatta, as the A-division boat of freshmen skipper Andrew Flynn and crew Margaret Wang took second behind BC and the B-division of freshman skipper Megan Watson and junior crew Cassandra Niemi won their division.

A division-winning showing by BC’s A-division let the Eagles slip between the Harvard squads for second.

The Harvard “second team” took third, skippered and crewed, respectively, in the A-division by freshman Jon Garrity and sophomore Alicia Harley. Juniors Robbie Macintosh and Ashley Nathanson sailed the B-division to third place.

—Staff writer Samuel C. Scott can be reached at sscott@fas.harvard.edu.