Racing This Weekend – Navy Lights

Folks…

All squads will be competing this weekend. Yale HWs and Women at home and all the rest on the road.

* Olympic Axe: Yale (HW) vs. Dartmouth, Housatonic River, Derby, CT
* Wit Cup: Columbia vs. Rutgers, Navy (LW), Orchard Beach Lagoon, Pelham, NY
* Jimmy Joy Cup: MIT vs. Georgetown, Yale (LW), Charles River, Cambridge, MA
* Yale (W) vs. Dartmouth, BU, Housatonic River, Derby, CT
* The 21st George Washington Invitational Regatta Potomac River – Washington, DC. Navy (HW) vs. George Washington, Georgetown and Gonzaga; Navy (W) vs. Iowa, MIT and George Mason

Coach Andy Card’s #2 ranked Yale LWs make the trip to Cambridge to compete for the Jimmy Joy Cup for the 34th time since 1974. Yale defends and has dominated the series 30-3 over MIT. Georgetown joins the competition this year.

Coach Rob Friedrich’s #3 ranked Navy LWs will attempt to get back to winning as they join Columbia and Rutgers in Wit Cup competition on the Orchard Beach Lagoon Course at Pelham, NY.

#9 ranked Yale HWs and #2 ranked Yale Women will both meet Dartmouth at Derby with BU joining in the women’s racing.

Navy Women continue and Navy HWs open their season at the George Washington Invitational Regatta on the Potomac River in DC. In the new regatta format both crews will meet three opponents in dual racing over 2,000 meters on Friday and Saturday {see article from Navy Sports below}

Collegiate/US Rowing Rankings below are from www.row2k.com.

I have also included an article from The Yale Herald, that I thought that you all might find interesting — Charlie Cole Yale ’07 reflects on winning the Oxford-Cambridge Boat Race.

GO BLUE!

Cheers!

Coach and TB406

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From Navy Sports:

Busy Weekend Ahead for Navy Crew Programs

ANNAPOLIS, MD. — This weekend, for the first time this spring, each of the three Navy crew programs will be in competition as the heavyweight and women’s teams will take part in the annual George Washington Invitational and the lightweight squad will square off against Columbia.

Now in its 21st year, the George Washington Invitational is one of the largest regattas held on the East Coast. The format for this year’s edition, slated to be held Friday and Saturday on the Potomac River, will follow the new style inaugurated last year which consists of boats racing against each other in a series of dual races.

Navy’s women’s team fared quite well in last year’s regatta as its crews combined to win 12 of its 16 races over the two days. Individually, the program’s varsity entry defeated Iowa by two seconds and St Joseph’s by six seconds and dropped a six-second contest against Clemson. The Mids will face both the Hawkeyes and the Hawks again this year, as well as MIT and George Mason.

“Beating Iowa was a big accomplishment for us last year,” said Navy women’s head coach Mike Hughes. “It was a tough race and we are going to need another strong effort against them and our other competitors in order to be as successful as we were a year ago.”

Navy’s heavyweight team did not take part in the George Washington Invitational last year, but the Mids had been the most successful program at the regatta over the final years in which it utilized the previous format of trial heats and finals. Navy’s varsity boat will face George Washington, Georgetown and Gonzaga this weekend.

“We always enjoy taking part in this event,” said Navy heavyweight head coach Rick Clothier. “The people who run it always work hard and put on a great regatta.

“Georgetown has come on strong this spring and has already put together good races against Cornell and Princeton. George Washington is a much improved team that has defeated Penn this year. We have not raced Gonzaga before, but they have shown they are able to hold their own on the West Coast.”

In addition to this weekend being the first time the Mids will be competing at the event under its present style, it also will mark the first racing of the year for the program. Navy enters the week with its varsity boat ranked 13th in the U.S. Rowing weekly poll of coaches. Georgetown’s lead entry is ranked 15th and George Washington’s varsity boat is ranked 19th in the same poll. Gonzaga was among the squads that also received votes.

“This is the latest we have started our competition in a number of years,” said Clothier. “We have worked hard all spring, are anxious to start racing and are excited to see what we are capable of doing.”

A complete race schedule with times and lane assignments can be found at www.gwir.org(.)

While the heavyweight and women’s team will be competing locally this weekend, the lightweight squad will head to New York City to race against Columbia on the Orchard Beach Lagoon. Saturday’s racing begins at 5 p.m. in Westchester County, with the finish line to the course located in the Northeast Bronx.

The Mids defeated the Lions in each of the four races held between the teams last year. Included in the results was a six-second win by Navy in the varsity race.

Navy’s varsity boat is ranked third and Columbia’s is ranked eighth in this week’s U.S. Rowing poll of coaches.

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USRowing Collegiate Poll
April 9, 2008

Men’s Varsity Eights
Team (1st-Place Votes) Points
1. University of Washington (19) 400
2. Princeton University 356
3. Harvard University 347
4. University of California 332
5. Brown University 304
6. Northeastern University 286
7. Stanford University 280
8. University of Wisconsin 261
9. Yale University 253
10. Cornell University 215
11. Syracuse University 195
12. Trinity College 131
13. United States Naval Academy 124
14. Oregon State University 103
15. Georgetown University 90
16. Boston University 88
17. Columbia University 86
18. University of Virginia 77
19. George Washington University 62
20. University of Michigan 49
Not Ranked But Receiving Votes: University of Pennsylvania 43, Purdue University 25, University of Southern California 13, University of California at San Diego 8, University of California at Los Angeles 7, Temple University 5, Colgate University 4, Orange Coast College 4, Gonzaga University 3, St. Joseph’s University 2, Dartmouth College 1 and Massachusetts Institute of Technology 1.
(This weeks men’s varsity eight voters: Craig Amerkhanian, Topher Bordeau, Chris Clark, Rex Clothier, Paul Cooke, Brooks Dagman, Dan Gehn, Steve Gladstone, Zach Johnson, Brooks Jones, Curtis Jordan, Anthony Kilbridge, Greg Myhr, David Padgett, John Pescatore, John Pojednic, David Reischman, Thomas Sullivan, Steve Todd, Mike Zimmer)

Men’s Lightweight Varsity Eights
Team (1st-Place Votes) Points
1. Cornell University (6) 193
2. Yale University (5) 188
3. United States Naval Academy 177
4t. Harvard University 169
4t. Princeton University 169
6. Dartmouth College 165
7. University of Pennsylvania 140
8. Columbia University 138
9. Georgetown University 132
10. University of Delaware 118
11. Fordham University 98
12. University of California 89
13. St. Joseph’s University 64
14. Massachusetts Institute of Technology 55
15. University of Texas 50
Not Ranked But Receiving Votes: United States Coast Guard Academy 42, University of Pittsburgh 35, Grand Valley State University 31, Holy Cross 23, Rutgers University 16, Purdue University 15, Georgia Tech 10, Boston College 8, Mercyhurst College 7, University of North Carolina 7 and Northwestern University 6.
(This weeks men’s lightweight eight voters: Scott Alwin, Ted Benford, Charley Butt, Andy Card, Robert Canavan, Rob Friedrich, Greg Hughes, Mike Irwin, Todd Kennett, Evans Liolin, Steve Perry)

Women’s NCAA Division I Varsity Eights
Team (1st-Place Votes) Points Previous Week
1. University of California (17) 491 1
2. Yale University (8) 470 2
3. University of Virginia 454 3
4. University of Washington 410 17
5. University of Southern California 384 4
6. Princeton University 372 5
7. Michigan State University 322 8
8. Washington State University 317 15
9. University of Tennessee 273 7
10. Stanford University 252 6
11. The Ohio State University 249 9
12. Brown University 227 11
13. Harvard University 173 13
14. University of Minnesota 161 12
15. University of Michigan 151 10
16. Notre Dame University 132 14
17. University of California at Los Angeles 122 18
18. Clemson University 109 16
19. University of Pennsylvania 56 20
20. Northeastern University 33 NR
Not Ranked But Receiving Votes: University of Texas 29, University of Wisconsin 16, University of Iowa 13, Dartmouth College 10, Gonzaga University 7, Bucknell University 6, University of Louisville 5, University of Central Florida 3, Columbia University 1, Cornell University 1 and United States Naval Academy 1.

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From the Yale Herald

Eli oarsman finds success across the pond

BY LAUREN SMITH

COURTESY TIME MAGAZINE
Charlie Cole, left, rowed in the seventh seat at the annual Oxford-Cambridge boat race.
Recent Yale graduate Charlie Cole, PC ’07, suited up in old blue and took to the oars again last weekend. This time, though, he was racing for Oxford. Cole competed on Sat., Mar. 29 at the 154th Annual Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race, which runs four miles and 734 yards along the Thames River in London. Twenty minutes and 53 seconds later, Cole’s Oxford University Boat Club crew secured a victory by six lengths.

Cole, who is a graduate student in Oxford’s Nature, Society and Environmental Policy program, was well-prepared to join the esteemed ranks of the Oxford-Cambridge boat race champions after his career with the Elis. But despite his past success, Cole admitted that he did not realize just how vaunted the accomplishment was. “I definitely didn’t appreciate the magnitude of it before coming over, and to an extent still don’t yet,” he said. The amateur race, which draws nearly 120 million viewers for the men’s heavyweight eight, is arguably the most popular rowing race in the world. “The boat race is a big deal over here, and I think even more so as the standard of the crews has improved in recent years,” Cole said.

Begun as a challenge between two friends at the competing universities in 1829, the race has been held annually since 1856. Since the race’s inception, Cambridge has racked up 79 wins to Oxford’s 74, with one dead heat. “It’s cool because it’s at the same time both an English institution and an extremely competitive rivalry, much like Yale-Harvard,” said Cole.

In fact, the race is more analogous to our historic rivalry than many modern students realize. The Yale-Harvard regatta, the oldest intercollegiate competition in America, predating the more publicized Game by 23 years, is in many ways a product of the Oxford-Cambridge Boat Race. Begun in 1852 and held annually since 1859, the Harvard-Yale race is of comparable length and is also held on the Thames River, albeit the one in New London, Connecticut.

Saturday’s race began with an oar toss, which gave Cambridge the right to choose the start station. After an even start, Oxford quickly obtained a small lead. “Our race plan was to be offensive whenever possible early in the race, which we did really well off the start, but primarily to be defensive, at least for the first half since we had to defend Cambridge’s advantage during the long surrey bend,” explained Cole. Neck and neck for the first half, each boat won favorable bends, but the favored Cambridge crew briefly drew ahead.

“We were probably a little too defensive in the middle of the race, judging by how much they got ahead after we were up by one length, and we rowed a little too within ourselves for that stage,” said Cole. But renewed vigor by the Oxford team launched a quicker stroke rate that the Cambridge rowers could not match. “A little over halfway into the race, when we hit the headwind full force and started to press away, we knew we were going to win, and we wanted to just put together our best rowing possible, to put on display what we had been working on in training,” he said. Obtaining more than a full boat length of a lead, the Oxford crew was able to claim the center line and reach the finish 16 seconds ahead of the competition.

Cole, a New Canaan, CT native who lettered his way through high school crew, was a member of the U.S. Junior National team in 2003 and 2004. The captain of last year’s Yale heavyweight crew team, he began his collegiate career with a bronze medal at the International Rowing Association regatta in 2003. Since then, Cole’s rowing career has seen him through in various competitions, including the 2006 U-23 World Champions in Hazewinkel, Belgium. Cole credits his four years at Yale with contributing heavily to his success. “[Yale] helped me learn how to thrive in a pretty competitive environment, to give me experience rowing in fast boats, and basically just mature physically and mentally,” he said. “I learned how to push myself, to extend my limits and to deal with external pressure and how to compete at a high level.” Cole concluded his time at Yale by helping lead his crew to its first victory over Harvard since 1999. “Winning [Harvard-Yale] gave me a pretty specific benefit in the sense that it gave me confidence in myself and my own racing ability, which I could draw on in tough racing situations,” he said.

And yet, experience and credentials are assumed for rowers interested in the Oxford-Cambridge challenge, not a pedigree for blanket membership. The build-up to the epic British race is an intense process. Each club must narrow a field of up to forty hopefuls to a squad of about 24 athletes, split into two teams. The teams conduct mock races along the course to test their abilities under actual conditions; the coaches select the final line-ups about one month prior to the race. And while “being in the blue boat was really cool because we got all the glory,” the full squad boasts 24 members. “Everyone on the team was working really hard,” acknowledged Cole.

The athletes, whose academic standing at their universities must not be compromised, endure grueling near-daily practices from September until April. Several non-regulatory races with international and professional programs pepper the season, but almost all of the preparation is geared towards the historic four-and-a-half mile race. While training is as demanding as any program at Yale, the atmosphere is much different, lacking Yale’s “inclusive environment.” The Oxford experience is defined by a lack of cohesiveness and a cutthroat determination to win. “It is simply about producing the fastest eight, with less of a concern about developing guys because the coaches know they will have a fresh talent pool of accomplished athletes year in, year out,” Cole said.

Having proven his talent and versatility as a rower at Yale, Charlie Cole has been able to establish that ability on an international level at the Oxford-Cambridge boat race. He has joined the ranks of Olympic athletes and rowing legends by participating in the oldest surviving sporting challenge in the world. From here, the waters are open.