Brown leads at Coed Dinghy Nationals

Newport, RI (May 30, 2019) – The first day of Finals racing in the Gill College Sailing Coed National Championship began today for the top eighteen college teams that advanced from the previous two days of Semifinals racing to compete for the Henry A. Morss Memorial Trophy.

Winds were light this morning, so the sailors were delayed a little over an hour before the first race got underway. When the wind increased from the south the conditions for the day were light to moderate averaging about 6-8 knots with a few higher puffs – there were only a few moments of hiking conditions.

A-division sailors were in FJs today and B-division in Z420s. Tomorrow the divisions switch boats.

#10 ranked Brown University leads the field, benefiting from their A-Division sitting in fifth and their B-Division closing the day in second. Only #6 ranked Georgetown has both their division teams in the top five.

“Today was about pressure,” says John Mollicone, head coach for Brown. “Lane management was an important skill today and because the winds were light there was not a lot of length on the course, so having clear air and a lane was important.

“We did a good job overall and our starts were good as well. When we did not have a good start, we managed to stay in the race and find passing lanes to get ahead of boats. We had some bad luck – if we missed a puff or two it was also easy to lose five or seven boats. We sailed smart in both divisions and we were really fast in B-division in the Z420s.”

Sailing for Brown is: Patrick Shanahan ’19 with Julia Reynolds ’21 in A-division and Ragna Agerup ’20 with Madeleine McGrath ’22 in B-division.

Where some of the teams in the top of the fleet had some back luck at the end of the day on the racecourse, #5 ranked Navy was able to take advantage and make some good decisions to move them up the leader board to second place.

Sailing for Navy is: Parker Loftus ’20 with Olivia de Olazarra ’22 and Emma Remis ’20 in A-division and Joseph Hermus ’22 with Ana Mier ’19 in B-division.

Georgetown University is sitting in third place tied in points with College of Charleston, but beating them in a head-to-head tiebreaker.

“Racing today was way harder than the Semifinals,” says Mike Callahan, head coach for Georgetown. “We tried to stay consistent and be in the top five. We did well in the beginning of the day but made some errors towards the end of the day and it’s hard to catch up in this fleet.

“We started well and put ourselves in a good position for the first beat, but towards the end of the day, what was working on one beat, wasn’t working on the next and it was difficult to make big gains in the conditions and the challenging competition. Overall we are okay with where we are and looking forward to more racing tomorrow.”

Sailing for Georgetown is: Sean Segerblom ’20 with Rebecca Fung ’19 in A-division and William Logue ’20 with Caroline Teare ’21 in B-division.

Racing is set to begin at 10 am tomorrow and the conditions are predicted to be light winds again. The championship concludes with no race beginning after 5 pm.

Results Coed Finals, Day 1 (10 races):
1. Brown University, 116
2. U.S. Naval Academy, 138
3. Georgetown University, 143
4. College of Charleston, 143
5. St. Mary’s College of Maryland, 150
6. Yale University, 154
7. Hobart and William Smith Colleges, 157
8. Dartmouth College, 176
9. U.S. Coast Guard Academy, 184
10. Stanford University, 200
11. Boston University, 200
12. Tufts University, 219
13. Old Dominion University, 224
14. Bowdoin College, 225
15. Jacksonville University, 230
16. Boston College, 239
17. Connecticut College, 246
18. University of California at Santa Barbara, 277

Event details – Results – Facebook

2019 Spring Nationals
May 21-24 – Women’s Dinghy
May 25-27 – Team Race
May 28-31 – Coed Dinghy

Live coverage will include:
May 23, half day of Women’s coverage.
May 24, full day of Women’s coverage and awards.
May 25, half to 3/4 day of Team Race coverage, release of Women’s recap video.
May 26, full day of Team Race coverage.
May 27, full day of Team Race coverage and awards.
May 28, release of Team Racing recap video.
May 29, full day of Coed coverage.
May 30, full day of Coed coverage.
May 31, full day of Coed coverage and awards.
June 3, release of Coed recap video.

For live coverage… click here.

The 2018-19 season for the Inter-Collegiate Sailing Association (ICSA) held the Match Racing Nationals and Singlehanded Nationals during the fall season, with the final three national titles on May 21 to 31 in Newport, RI.

Source: ICSA