BOSTON – This weekend, the Yale coed sailing team placed fifth at the 74th Erwin Schell Trophy at MIT, earning themselves a spot at the Atlantic Coast Championships. An all-freshman team competed just outside of Boston at the Freshman New England Championships and took home the Nickerson Trophy for winning the event. The Bulldogs also tied for first at the Dave Perry Trophy.
There was little to no wind on the Charles River on Saturday. The race committee was able to get two races off in each division and spent the rest of the day attempting to start races, with no success, as the breeze kept filling in for a few minutes then dying below the wind minimum.
On Sunday, the regatta got off to an early start with much better breeze than Saturday. 10 races were completed in the 6-14 knot southwesterly.
Junior Ian Barrows skippered A division with junior crews Amelia Dobronyi and Natalya Doris. Despite two tough races on Saturday, they managed to place fifth, just eight points out of second, winning three out of 10 races on Sunday.
In B division were the junior duo of Mitchell Kiss and Clara Robertson. They placed seventh.
At Tufts, the freshman class demonstrated their great potential by winning the New England Freshman Championship with a significant margin at a particularly tricky venue. Twenty teams competed for the Nickerson Trophy in Tufts' fleet of Larks.
Skipper Nick Hernandez with crews Claire Rossi de Leon and Kira Woods placed fourth in A division. They were 10 points out of first.
In B division, Nic Baird, Rossi de Leon and Woods had an outstanding performance. They won six of the eight races they sailed, never placing out of the top three.
At Roger Williams University, the Bulldogs placed fifth at the Dave Perry Trophy. Many of the Bulldogs that competed in the event had never before sailed a team race event, so their focus this weekend was to learn as much as possible.
Sailing the event were senior Eric Anderson with junior Chandler Gregoire, junior Charles Skoda with sophomore Caroline Colwell and sophomore Patrick Buehler with freshman Ayla Besemer.
They did exactly that. Skoda explained that they had many close finishes throughout the event, and said, "There was a steep learning curve… It was really fun and I learned a ton."
The ACCs will take place in two weeks at Old Dominion University, in Norfolk, Va. Next weekend, Baird, Kiss and sophomore Malcolm Lamphere will travel to Old Dominion for the Men's Singlehanded National Championships.
To see full results from this weekend, visit http://scores.collegesailing.org.
Report filed by Natalya Doris '17, Yale Sports Publicity
