The men's and women's crew teams hit rough waters in their road trip down to Lake Quinsigamond in Worcester, Mass. last Saturday. The meet was dominated by Ithaca, while Tufts' lightweight eight women's boat was the only Jumbo crew to win its race.
The women's lightweight eight dominated the race, crossing the line in 7:58.1, leading the race from beginning to end and beating its nearest competition, the Holy Cross Crusaders, by just over 40 seconds.
"The varsity lightweight eight had a great race," coach Gary Caldwell said. "They controlled it from the beginning to the end and won by a very impressive margin."
The women's varsity eight had more difficulty contending with the Holy Cross boat. Ithaca definitively won the race with a time of 7:02.5. Tufts led Holy Cross through three-quarters of the race, but the Crusaders were able to overtake the Jumbos towards the end. Tufts finished in 7:17.9, just 3.2 seconds behind Holy Cross, but five seconds ahead of NESCAC rival Connecticut College.
"Ithaca will probably be ranked the number two crew in the country this week," Caldwell said. "We were ahead of Holy Cross, but we just ran out of gas at the end. We still have a lot of improving to do."
Freshman Bridie McElroy was back for Saturday's varsity eight race after having missed practice earlier in the week because of a persistent stress fracture in her ribs.
"As a whole the boat agreed that we weren't as happy as we could have been with this race," McElroy said. "Ithaca was an amazing boat so I didn't expect to beat them. However, we should have beaten Holy Cross. If we had raced against them the way we have raced in previous matches we would have beaten them and beat Connecticut College by a greater margin. We definitely will have a chance against Holy Cross at New Englands."
The men's varsity eight did not perform up to expectations on Saturday, coming through in last place. Once again, Ithaca finished first (6:24.1), while Holy Cross took second, followed by Connecticut College and Holy Cross B. Tufts was the last boat to cross the line, finishing in a time of 6:38.8. Still, the competition was tight, as the margin of victory between the first and last boat was only 14.7 seconds.
"I don't exactly know what happened," coach Ben Foster said. "We haven't raced well yet this season and part of that is the inexperience and the nerves that comes with a young boat. We are still working on putting a good race together."
As has been a constant obstacle this season, the young boat's inexperience probably factored into the loss.
"We just weren't together," freshman Jonathan Goulet said. "We weren't used to the setup and I think a lot of people, myself included, were very nervous. We had a good week of practice, especially the last two days before the race. At the race though, we just had no rhythm or flow."
The women's varsity four raced against the stern four of the varsity open eight boats for Holy Cross, Connecticut College, and Ithaca. Holy Cross won the race with a time of 8:47.3, followed by Connecticut College in 8:58.6. The Jumbos came in third place with a time of 9:14.2, beating both the Ithaca and Ithaca B boats.
This weekend, the Jumbos will participate in the New England varsity four championships in Lowell, Mass. If the varsity four compete well enough at this meet, they will be invited to the Open New England Championships with the rest of the Tufts crews on May 5th and 6th.
"We were very encouraged by their performance in this race," Caldwell said. "The two crews that beat us were formed from the varsity eight boats of those schools and therefore they are not indicative of the competition we will be seeing at New Englands."
Both the men's second varsity and women's novice crews returned to competition this week after having a weekend off due to weather cancellation. The men's second varsity boat lost to Ithaca, Holy Cross, and Connecticut College, finishing the race in 7:01.1. The women's novice boat (8:18.0) lost to both Ithaca and Connecticut College, but did manage to beat Holy Cross by nearly 20 seconds. The second novice boat (8:40.9) lost to both Connecticut College and Ithaca, but defeated Connecticut College B and Holy Cross.
Next week, the women's varsity, lightweight, and novice boats go up against Smith College and Mount Holyoke. Earlier this season, Holy Cross topped Smith, but with only about half the margin of victory by which it beat Tufts last weekend. And while Mount Holyoke's varsity eight doesn't appear to be a factor for this race, the lightweight eight promises to be an even match-up with the Jumbo lightweights, and a good test to see where the team stands before Nationals.
The men's boats will be taking on Massachusetts Maritime Academy, a team that the Jumbos defeated last season. They are now looking towards the May 5th New England Championships.
"In the long run this last race is not that important," Foster said. "We are going to regroup this week and go at it again next weekend. We need to keep racing, getting more experience under our belt."
The women's squad is also looking towards New Englands, but in order to be competitive, the team says it needs more speed.
"All of our boats need to be faster," Caldwell said. "That is what we are striding to do each week."
