Nevin's Trophy Intersectional
The weekend of September 17-18, Columbia sailed in one of the top regattas in college sailing, the Nevin’s Trophy Intersectional. Brendan Hannon CC’11 and Marie Johnson, BC’12 sailed A division, John Croll SEAS’12 and Kerry Morrison CC’11 sailed B division, and Will Ford CC’13 sailed C division. In the weeks leading up to this regatta, the team have had the opportunity to practice out at Kings Point. These practices have been exceptionally windy and wavy. However it was to everyone’s dismay then that a high-pressure system came in post-Thursday’s hair-raising storm to bring only light wind for this weekend of racing. Saturday morning had the best breeze for the weekend with a NW breeze at 5-7 knots, which allowed for the fleet to get six sets in. As it clocked to the SE in the afternoon, the breeze died out and races were abandoned. Sunday was even lighter. The southerly tried to fill in throughout the morning with no success do to the tower of heat rising over the city creating a hole in the breeze at Kings Point. Eventually the regatta was called with no racing able to get off on Sunday.
The Columbia team had a tough time due to the challenging conditions and tough competition, but we came out of the weekend with several goals for our season ahead. All three divisions realized the importance of clean start at the favored end. Pin dominated this weekend and was a challenge to win with the current. Our second main challenge was crowded mark roundings. With the majority of the fleet compressing into a pack at the starboard layline of windward mark and then a cluster of a pinwheel around the leeward mark-- coming out of these roundings in a favorable position was definitely a challenge. No matter what, this was a great weekend to enjoy the beautiful warm weather and gain a lot of experience from excellent competition. We will take what we learned into the North #1 qualifier next weekend.