Jan Friis and Marchiando Trophies

Over the weekend April 6^th and 7^th the Michigan sailing team traveled to Boston to compete in the Jan Friis and Marchiando Trohies, hosted by Tufts and MIT. The 12 hour drive was the fourth 10+ hour drive of the season for the team, which is necessary for the team to compete against the best teams in the ICSA. The regatta featured 15 teams starting out in two separate locations on the first day, then split into gold and silver fleets on Sunday. On Saturday the Charles River featured sunny skies and a 5-20 knot northwesterly breeze which provided for tricky, but fun team racing conditions in FJ’s. Michigan finished the day with 2 wins and 12 losses which was an improvement from last years performance of one win against all of the varsity teams such as Stanford, Harvard,

Will Cyr and Tom Etheridge

MIT, Boston College, etc. The weekends team consisted of skippers: Matt Graham '13, Ryan Seago '14,Will Cyr '14, and the crews were Karinne Smolenyak '14, Katie Barbour '15, Emily Gazall '16 and Tom Etheridge '16. The team then went back to home of freshman Braden Engstrom, where we watched Michigan’s final four basketball game vs. Syracuse. The Engstrom's were gracious hosts all weekend long and the team thoroughly enjoyed their excellent hospitality.

Pre-start Day 2

On Sunday the team went to the silver fleet location at Tufts to sail in larks. The day featured mostly cloudy skies, 50 degree temperatures, and 10-25 knot winds. The puffy conditions allowed for some thrilling downwind team racing and even a few capsizes.  Overall, the team was a little bit rusty, but definitely improved as the weekend progressed. The team finished the regatta in 15^th place and we were glad that we were able to face the same level of competition that will be seen in May at nationals. 

-Ryan Seago '14