Sailing Practices for Nationals

After dealing with bitter cold, day-long road trips and the lack of its co-ed captain for a few weeks, the Harvard sailing team was finally out in full force last weekend, as the No. 4 co-ed squad and the No. 6 women’s team sailed in a total of three regattas along the East Coast, picking up a third-, a fourth-, and a fifth-place finish in the spring season’s fourth weekend of action.

While the Northeast was where the bulk of the Crimson competed over the weekend, the most important practice still came from preparing for Nationals at Navy.

“We wanted to get some time sailing and getting used to the waters down here,” junior captain Kyle Kovacs said of sailing in Annapolis. “So in that regard, we got some good experience.”

OWEN TROPHY

The U.S. Naval Academy hosted the Owen Trophy in Annapolis, Md., on Saturday and Sunday, also the site of the national championships in May. Though it was not a regatta the Crimson usually would participate in, Harvard sent four sailors from the co-ed team to gain some experience for nationals.

The Crimson responded well, earning third place overall.

“The conditions were very tricky, and it was a breeze direction that I’ve never seen before,” Kovacs said. “We had some issues starting the races, and we were playing catch-up in most of the races, so we would have liked to be more solid. We were a little disappointed.”

Kovacs and junior crew Elyse Dolbec turned in the best performance of the weekend, coming in second in B-division with a total of 50 points. Yale won the division with just 32 points.

In A-division, senior skipper Clay Johnson and senior crew Kristen Lynch’s 66 points helped Harvard to fifth place, just behind Tufts, which had 64.

“There was a lot of starting and stopping for Clay and I, and we spent a lot of time waiting around for the wind to fill in,” Kovacs said. “It was difficult to get a good rhythm.”

Overall, the Bulldogs took first place with Dartmouth in second. Connecticut College and host Navy followed the Crimson in the final standings.

“While it might not have gone well for both Kyle and myself, we need to give a lot of credit to our crews,” Johnson said. “They did an awesome job adjusting and transitioning very well.”

BOSTON DINGHY CLUB CUP

Along with MIT and Boston University, Harvard hosted the Boston Dinghy Club Cup on the Charles over the weekend. A total of 18 teams participated, with Roger Williams coming out on top. The Crimson took fifth overall, just behind the University of Rhode Island, St. Mary’s College, and Brown.

The A-division tandem of senior skipper Matt Knowles and sophomore crew Lauren Brants took eighth place, while in B-division, sophomore women’s captain Megan Watson and senior crew Christina Dahlman guided Harvard to a seventh-place finish.

In C-division, a freshman tandem dominated its way to a first-place finish for the Crimson. Skipper Drew Robb and crew Hyunjin Kim posted just 62 points in the win, 17 points less than the next closest teams, Navy and the Hawks of Roger Williams.

EMILY WICK TROPHY

The Hawks might have had great success in Boston, but the team couldn’t emulate that success in its own event, the women’s Emily Wick Trophy, held on Saturday in Bristol, R.I.

Two divisions saw five races each, with Harvard taking fourth place in the 10-team field.

—Staff writer Malcom A. Glenn can be reached at mglenn@fas.harvard.edu.