The Dartmouth sailing team began its season this weekend with regattas across New England. Although poor weather conditions in previous weeks made preseason training difficult, the Big Green sailors took advantage of early competition as a chance to pinpoint areas for improvement.
Both the women's and coed teams ranked in the top three in the 2013 college preseason rankings released by Sailing World. The women placed first on the list, receiving 16 of 17 first place votes while the coed team ranked third in the poll.
Charlotte Snow '15, Chris Price '14, Deirdre Lambert '15 and Carissa Crawford 14 traveled to Yale University to compete in the 39th Harry H. Anderson Jr. Trophy. The A team, made up of Lambert and Crawford, finished in sixth place with 109 points, while the B team made up of Snow and Price sailed to a ninth place finish, earning 135 points. The team finished eighth overall with 244 combined points. The hometown Bulldogs finished first.
The regatta was an intersectional conference instead of an in-conference competition, giving the Big Green a chance to race against schools that it wouldn't usually compete with such as the U.S. Naval Academy and the University of Wisconsin.
"We focused on getting back into the groove of sailing and on fine-tuning our boat handling," Snow said. "We went into the weekend with a mindset that we hadn't sailed as much as other teams, and we did a pretty good job considering that fact."
As the first regatta of the season, the competition allowed sailors to prepare for races to come.
"We struggled most with our starts, which was important in this regatta because the teams that had good starts had good races," Snow said. "It was a good takeaway."
A second group of Big Green sailors competed in the Penobscot Bay Open, hosted by the Maine Maritime Academy. The A team of Colin Murphy '15 and Abigail Rohman 16 finished in second place for 58 points, while the B team of Ian Storck '15 and Madeleine Cooney '17, finished in ninth place for 82 points. Overall, the Big Green turned in an eighth place finish in the competition. The team from the University of Vermont took the cup.
For the greater part of the regatta, Murphy said, the sailors faced tough conditions, as the wind often shifted.
"We were behind most schools in terms of practice, so it was more about focusing on little things than results," Murphy said.
Another group of Big Green sailors, including Scott Houck '15, Hunter Johnstone '16, Hope Wilson '16 and Charlie Lalumiere '17 traveled to New London, Conn., for the 71st Pine Trophy hosted by the United States Coast Guard Academy. The regatta provided sailors with the unique opportunity to race in four-person boats as opposed to two-person boats.
"We usually sail with two people in a boat, using the same boats every weekend," Wilson said. "We don't even have big boats at our lake, so we went into the regatta not having practiced sailing that type of boat."
Although the Big Green sailors began their races with a strong Saturday performance, a protest filed against them during Sunday's races resulted in a disqualification, leaving them in seventh place with 54 points. The Bulldogs won the regatta.
"[The protest was] frustrating because we had been happy with how we'd sailed," Wilson said.
Nonetheless, the regatta was an important learning experience.
"Each race was more practice for us," Wilson said, "Our maneuvers got better each time we did them."
This weekend, the Dartmouth sailing team will compete in five regattas the Nevins Trophy at King's Point, N.Y., the Hatch Brown Trophy hosted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the Lake Champlain Open in Burlington and the Central 2/Boston Harbor Invite hosted by Boston College. The Big Green will also host the yearly Women's Mrs. Hurst Bowl.
The Big Green sailors hope to get some valuable practices in before the weekend to prepare themselves for their competitions. Regardless, the sailors are optimistic about the season's beginning.
"I think we're all feeling pretty good," Wilson said. "If we get some good practice in before this weekend, it should definitely pay off."
The team is also excited about the freshmen beginning with the Big Green, most of whom were able to compete this weekend.
"We have a pretty strong team, and the group of '17s that we got is really great," Snow said. "I think the season is looking good."
