Radcliffe Lightweights Finish Second, Heavyweights Sixth at National Events

Commencement may be done, but some Radcliffe crew seniors have not cut all ties to Harvard yet.

This weekend, the top-ranked lightweight Black and Weight varsity crews headed to Sacramento, Calif., to take on a stacked field at the IRA National Championships while the heavyweight crews traveled to Indianapolis, Ind., to compete at the NCAA Championships.

HEAVYWEIGHTS

While a tornado was blowing through Oklahoma, the same weather system was disrupting the NCAA Championships. Though the devastation—which at one point caused a boat to sink during a race— was not as great up north, the barrage of thunderstorms hindered progress of the regatta all weekend.

“We are an outdoor sport, and you have to deal with the conditions that are there, but it was just a really wicked weekend of weather,” Radcliffe coach Liz O’Leary said. “It blew hard, straight headwind for the first two days and a quartering headwind for the final day. This was a first for me, in that I’ve never been to a regatta where every single race time wasn’t as it was originally scheduled.”

Both the first and second varsity eights placed second in their Friday morning heats, each advancing to the A/B semifinals. But in the A/B semifinals the next day, the boats failed to place in the top three in their respective heats, which qualified the crews for the petite, or ‘B’ final.

“On Saturday morning, neither boat had what I thought, unfortunately, was their best performance,” O’Leary said. “When you’re in a tournament like this or any sport, you have to be consistent enough in your racing to be able to do what you need to do at each step of the way to continue advancing.”

The first varsity eight petite final, which was rescheduled to Sunday due to weather, also featured Ivy foes Yale and Brown. After losing to both during dual-season racing and to the Bulldogs at the Ivy League Championships, the 1V8 boat found its stroke and took second in the race. Radcliffe’s time of 6:27.627 was four seconds faster than Yale and good enough to place the crew at eighth-best in the nation.

The 2V8 petite final pitted the Black and White against crews from across the country and quickly turned into a hotly contested race. The top four boats finished within two seconds of each other, and the second, third, and fourth boats all crossed the line within one-tenth of a second, with Radcliffe’s crew taking fourth place.

“[One-tenth of a second—] that’s an inch, maybe,” O’Leary said. “It was a really tight race, and in the end, it came down to which crew had their blades in the water and were pulling rather than who was on the recovery. You can imagine a swimmer—if your timing is perfect, you’re just reaching out to touch the finish line.”

The other boat that raced for the Black and White raced in the ‘C’ final, having finished in fourth in its original heat. Radcliffe’s fours boat took third in that race, finishing the course in 7:29.661.

“[The fours boat], I thought, got stronger as the weekend went along, but unfortunately, if you’re not at your best when you start the regatta, you dig yourself into a hole that’s hard to get out of,” O’Leary said.

LIGHTWEIGHTS

After finding the top of the podium all season, the No. 1 first varsity eight crew found itself in an unfamiliar position at the end of the IRA National Championships.

The boat easily cruised into the grand final with a time of 6:38.99 while second-ranked Stanford won its heat as well, racing the course in 6:39.39 to record the faster time on the day.

The next day at the grand final, the Black and White 1V8 boat began the race bow to bow with the Cardinals, but at the 1000-meter mark, Stanford pulled ahead and never trailed Radcliffe to clinch its fourth consecutive national championship.

“They just pushed it out a bit more the whole race, but we definitely never lost sight of them to the end,” said Emma Lukasiewicz, rowing in the sixth seat and the lone senior in the first varsity eight boat. “It was disappointing, but we had a fantastic race and are really pleased with the silver.”

But thanks to a first-place finish at Eastern Sprints the week before, the 1V8 boat’s season is not quite done. On June 24, the Black and White’s top lightweight crew will participate at the Henley Regatta, held on the Thames, for the first time in Radcliffe history.

“This is the first time that the lightweight women have ever gotten to travel abroad—we’ve never been given the opportunity, so this is really exciting for us,” Lukasiewicz said. “We want to show that we’ve earned it, and it definitely means a lot to me as a senior because it means that my season isn’t over, and I think it’ll be really cool to see what we can do against some new teams.”

The lightweight fours pulled out a similar finish to their 1V8 counterparts. After finishing in second in the heat to Wisconsin, the Black and White crossed the finals line seven seconds behind the Badgers, giving Radcliffe its second silver medal of the day.

—Staff writer Samantha Lin can be reached at samanthalin@college.harvard.edu. Follow her on Twitter at @linsamnity.