Sailing | Break is no pleasure cruise for sailing team

     In what has become an annual trip, the sailing team spent its spring break practicing with the St. Mary's squad, and it proved to be a prudent decision for the nationally ranked No. 10 Jumbos. Still, the Jumbos suffered in their first race, finishing in ninth place overall at this past weekend's Truxtun Umsted Intersectional.
    "The spring break training trip was a blast," junior Tomas Hornos said. "We were able to practice with the [second-] best team in the country, and that gave us a gauge for our team to let us know how much more we have to improve."
    "From a sailing standpoint, we got some great practice," senior Dan Hurwit added. "We sailed 420s and FJs, which are the boats used at most other schools, and we saw a wide range of breeze so were able to work on our boat handling and tactics in all different wind conditions. We also had a few days to practice with St. Mary's, which was a lot of fun and provided some great competition, especially in team racing, which is a big focus in the spring season."
    But after the week of cordially sailing, practicing and socializing with the St. Mary's squad, the Jumbos decided to get down to business. At this past weekend's Truxtun Umsted Intersectional at Navy, they were pitted not only against their recent acquaintances from the Mid-Atlantic region but also against some of the toughest sailing competition in the United States. Fifteen of the nation's top 20 teams were present at the Intersectional, by far the largest regatta so far this spring. Nine of the top 10 teams were present, with the exception of No. 9 Brown University.
    The Intersectional was broken into four divisions and called for four different classes of boats: The A and B divisions were double-handed, sailing in 420s and FJs respectively, while the C division was single-handed in a Laser and the D division single-handed in a Laser Radial. This format tested each team's depth and the diversity of its talent, as each boat handles differently and can require significantly different approaches to each race.
    Unfortunately, because of a general state of fatigue after a long week of training, the Jumbos weren't able to perform as well as they had hoped.
    "Truxtun was poor because we may have been tired from an entire week of training and we were just never in the groove — we were never in it," Hornos said.
    In the A division, senior tri-captain Baker Potts and senior Christina Kelly sailed to a 15th-place overall finish with 204 points in 17 races with one point per finishing place. The B division saw a slight improvement in scoring and overall place, as seniors Peter Bermudez and Francine Magasinn pulled in 177 points for 13th place.
    Tufts faired slightly better in the single-handed competition, however. Juniors Andrew Criezis and Hornos took the helm for the Jumbos in the C and D divisions en route to an 11th-place finish on 180 points and 8th-place finish on 130 points, respectively.
    "I think everyone on the team could use a little more experience racing in large intersectionals," Hornos said. "Also, we need to learn how to clean up our little mistakes and to minimize the damage when things don't go our way."
    "The competition at the Trux was extremely strong," Hurwit added. "The top teams from all around the country sent their best. So though we didn't end up doing as well as we could have, there were some moments of brilliance that we are proud of. I think for one thing, we were dead tired from spring break. Also, the wind was pretty dismal for most of the two days and that makes for really intense and close racing, and we were we underpowered and on the heavy side in several of our divisions. We're also still rusty as it is early on in the season for us."
    The regatta was a strong indicator of the current state of affairs on the collegiate sailing circuit — the national rankings were relatively consistent with the regatta's overall finishes: No. 1 Georgetown, No. 2 St. Mary's, No. 3 Boston College and No. 4 Yale finished first, fifth, third and second respectively. No. 6 Charleston finished fourth overall, host No. 7 Navy finished seventh and No. 8 Harvard finished eighth. The Jumbos, of course, outsailed their No. 10 ranking by coming in ninth.
    When asked what was needed for improvement, Hurwit's answer was simple.
    "Practice and dedication," he said. "We have the ability — we just need to bonecrush when we're at regattas."
    One bright spot for Tufts at Navy were sophomore Catherine Swanson and freshman Midori Tanaka, who won the Navy Women's Intersectional on the first weekend of break. Due to their efforts at the seven-race series, the pair was named the New England Intercollegiate Sailing Association's Sailors of the Week after posting second place finishes in three of their last four races to win the A Division by a slim two-point margin.
    Despite the flashes of brilliance, the Tufts squad still feels that there is room for improvement as the spring season gets into full swing.  
    "Our goals are still to perform at the highest level that we know that we are capable of," Hornos said. "We need to chill out a little from our spring break and all get on the same page. We should be able to do well this weekend at the Boston Dinghy Cup at MIT — after a week of being at home and sailing at a place familiar to us, I have high expectations."