Tufts Sailing continues to shine

After impressive finishes last week, placing first in two regattas and second in another, the Tufts co-ed sailing team kept up a strong late season surge and won two of three regattas this past weekend.

At the Admiral's Cup at the Massachusetts Maritime Academy, the Jumbos beat 19 other teams, including Harvard, which finished second and Mass Maritime, which hosted the event and finished eighth. This was the co-ed squad's first fleet racing intersectional victory of the season.

Tufts beat out the Crimson by 23 points for first overall. The team was lead by a strong showing in the A division, where skipper and senior co-captain Pete Levesque and alternating crew members senior co-captain Caroline Hall and freshman Bryan Prior won the division.

Senior JR Maxwell and sophomore Liz Haddad finished fifth in the B division, while freshman Zander Kirkland placed second in the C division.

After the first day of sailing, the Jumbos found themselves out of first place by 30 points.

"We were disappointed with where we stood after Saturday," Hall said. "On Sunday we went out and benefited from sailing closer to our ability and from other teams choking."

One of those other teams was St. Mary's College, which was leading heading into the second day. A series of bad races in the C division left it in fourth place overall and allowed the opportunistic Jumbos to take first.

In other activity, the Jumbos won the Oberg Trophy hosted by MIT and placed fourth of 18 teams at the Boston University trophy.

These other competitions have been a great venue for the strong freshman class to showcase its skills against some good competition from other schools. At the Oberg Regatta, the Jumbos were led by freshmen David Siegal, who skippered the A division, and Jeff Cruise, in the B division.

Siegal and his partner, junior Katie Shuman, placed second in the A division, while Cruise and his partner, junior Ariel Fromer, finished first in the B division.

"[We raced well by] taking advantage of the slight breeze to do as well as possible," Cruise said. "We did not make any mental mistakes and raced strong on both days of competition."

As a result of its strong performances, the co-ed squad remained at third in the nation in the most recent rankings. The team will race in two regattas this weekend, one at Tufts and the other hosted by the Coast Guard.

The Jumbos are also preparing for the New England Team Racing Championships to be held at Tufts in two weeks.

The women's squad ran into trouble this past week, and placed sixth out of 18 teams at the Dellenbaugh Women's Intersectional at Brown University last weekend. This regatta was the largest of the spring season for the women.

St. Mary's, ranked first nationally, ran away with the regatta, beating second place Brown University by over 50 points. A small consolation for the Jumbos was that their sixth place finish was one spot and 26 points better than rival Harvard. Also, the team finished second among teams from New England.

Junior AJ Crane skippered the A division to fifth place, while senior Clare Dooley handled those responsibilities for Tufts in the B division for a sixth place finish. The combined result of 172 points was one point behind fifth place Charleston College and nine behind fourth place Hobart/William Smith College.

Though the overall result was not up to the Jumbo's expectations, Hall pointed out that the team finished second to other New England schools at the regatta. She hopes that this slant on the results will go a long way in terms of the team's confidence heading into next weekend's Women's New England Championships. The team will also emphasize its strong mid-season performances to get ready.

The women's team fell one spot in the national rankings as a result of its competitions. The focus now falls on the New England Championships, which will also be held at Brown. Teams that place in the top five at New Englands will advance to the National Championships.