SAN DIEGO, Calif. – With just four races remaining before the Bulldogs complete the preliminary round robin of the Laser Performance Team Race National Championship, they currently sit in first place with a 10-1 record. Tomorrow, they will sail some of their most challenging races, among them match-ups against the No. 1 Georgetown Hoyas and the No. 2 Boston College Eagles.

Sailing for the Bulldogs on Saturday were skippers junior Ian Barrows, sophomore Malcolm Lamphere and freshman Nic Baird with crews senior Charlotte Belling and juniors Chandler Gregoire and Meredith Megarry. The day's skipper-crew combinations were chosen to maximize speed and boat-handling in light wind velocities, which were the predominant conditions of the day.

In the morning, wind speeds were in the range of 0-4 knots out of the south and some races were completed in marginal winds at or below the legal minimum speed of 3 knots. The breeze picked up slowly throughout the day to 8 knots and shifted west.

The Bulldogs were held back in some races today by some unusual umpire calls – when a boat is given a red flag by an umpire, they must complete a 720 penalty turn before they are allowed to continue in the race, which puts a good amount of distance between that boat and its competition. On Saturday, umpires made several unexpected calls to almost every team at the event, some of which affected the Bulldogs.

Despite these challenging conditions and unpredictable umpire calls, the Bulldogs lost only one race of 11. They look forward to keeping their momentum going on Sunday, when they plan to focus on getting good starts and trusting their well-practiced boat-handling, speed, and fleet racing tactics.

Follow results at http://scores.collegesailing.org/s16/laserperformance-team-race-nationals/. Sunday's first race is scheduled for 10:30 a.m. PST.

Report filed by Natalya Doris '17, Yale Sports Publicity