The brain trust in the back of the boat featured Alex Ramos
(’15) on the helm and Tom Etheridge (’16) trimming main and calling flawless
tactics. The string pullers sharing the
cockpit with the afterguard were Chris Cyr (’16) at primary trim, Connor Shope
(’15) at secondary trim, and Max Odena (’16) and Braden Engstrom (’16) as
grinders. On the pointy end of the boat,
Jason Doyle (’15) was on bow, Stu Starkweather (’15) at mast, and Kirsten
Boelkins (’15) in the pit. Liz Wallace
(’15) and Ryan Davidson (’15) took turns as floats and Kendall Witmer (’15) and
Abby Rogers (’16) served as alternates.
Saturday morning proved to be fairly miserable as it was
cold and raining for most of the morning.
None the less, the team took to Long Island Sound and began preparing
for the first race. We were a little
rusty in our first race, having troubles both up and downwind and ended up
taking a fourth in the first race. As
the wind built we switched over to our #3 jib and proceeded to decimate the
competition upwind ultimately taking a first.
The next two races, the team was a little more aggressive at the starts
and were called back both times but fought valiantly into third place each
time. So after racing, we retired to the
Davidson’s house, discussed our strategy for overcoming the 6 point deficit to
the Merchant Marine Academy (MMA), and watched the U of M football team get a
much needed win.
Sunday morning was a bit chilly but could otherwise could
not have been better; sunny and wind around 15 knots. We nailed the first start and proceeded to
attempt to pinch off the MMA, eventually forcing them to tack out and foul
Mass. Maritime. We showed great
improvement over the previous day of racing and soundly beat the rest of the
fleet with nearly perfect performances on all aspects of the course. The next race we had another brilliant start
and finished over a minute ahead of the next boat. At this point the wind shut down and the
regatta was called with U of M ending up in first overall by three points.
A huge thank you to the Davidson family for housing us, Phil
Gutin for donating his boat, Beagle, to the team, and Ryan Malloy and Cliff
Crowley for serving as owners reps and making sure we didn’t do anything to
stupid.
--Tom Etheridge, '16
