Crew prepped for Ivy success

Yale men's heavyweight crew faced the same Dartmouth team on Sat., Apr. 14 in Derby, Conn. that easily defeated them last spring. The same Dartmouth crew team that qualified for the grand final at both the Eastern Sprints and the national championship IRA regatta. The same team that retained its varsity boat make-up and entered the race against Yale with confidence that they would triumph over the Bulldogs yet again. But the Bulldogs proved the Dartmouth crew wrong.

COURTESY SPORTS PUBLICITY Ranked seventh in the Ivy League, Yale heavyweight crew defeated Dartmouth on Sat., Apr. 14 for its first Ivy victory of the season.  The Elis face Penn and Columbia in Philadelphia on Sat., Apr. 21.  The Bulldogs hope to avenge their loss to Penn earlier this season at the San Deigo Classic.

Last Saturday's race heralded the start of a season that Yale team members believe will be very different from last spring. "We had no crews in the [grand] finals of Eastern Sprints last year," Andrew Persson, PC '02, said. "This year it's definitely the goal of all our crews to make the grand final of Sprints with the possibility of medaling."

Although the Bulldogs' official racing season started a few weeks later than other teams', the Yale crews attended the San Diego Crew Classic Regatta two weekends ago to gain racing experience. "We went out there because, among other things, our schedule starts late, so it's good to go somewhere early to see the best crews," Head Coach Dave Vogel said. Teams from the West Coast that raced in the regatta, like CalTech and the University of Washington, frequently qualify as the fastest college crews in the nation. "There are a number of great opportunities at a race like that," Vogel continued. "Seeing the speed of the best crews, like CalTech which has had more water time because of the warm weather, and experiencing racing six boats across—all this is good preparation for Eastern Sprints." The Bulldogs survived this test of speed—the varsity boat qualified for the grand final this year after failing to do so at this regatta last year.

In the race against Dartmouth the Elis faced not only a formidable racing opponent but also difficult rowing conditions. A strong tailwind and a fast current down the racecourse helped Yale set course records last weekend, but they also made rowing technically difficult for both teams.

Aside from managing the weather conditions, Yale's varsity and JV boats began the race well. "The JV took four seats right at the start of the race, and the varsity took six seats at the start of their race," Persson said. Although last year the Varsity boat failed to effectively combat Dartmouth's strong sprint at the end of the race, "this year the varsity was able to hold them off," Persson added. With 750 meters remaining in the 2,000 meter race Dartmouth started to creep up on the Yale varsity boat, but the Bulldogs managed to remain ahead and increase their lead with a sprint to end the race. "It's not worth going out to race if you're going to wait until 750 to do it," Nate Kirk, BR'02, said of the Dartmouth varsity.

Harvard remains the team's biggest rival because of the special history surrounding the Yale-Harvard match-up, which takes place on Sat., June 3. But as team member John Keane, PC '02, said, "Last year we had so many losses that this year each team we're racing, we're out to prove something to them."

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