The thermometer read 40, and the rain was relentless, but Georgetown crew still clawed its way through some tough competition last weekend, earning some promising results in the process. The Hoyas fell short often, though, claiming just one top prize over the weekend.
The men’s heavyweights earned a second-place finish at the 19th annual George Washington University Invitational, while the lightweight men had mixed results against Delaware, Harvard and Rutgers at Mercer Lake in Windsor, N.J.
Meanwhile, the women met old foes once again on the water, as they faced Princeton – among other tough opponents – once again in the Knecht Cup races in Camden, N.J.
Despite dismal rowing conditions, both the heavyweight and lightweight women’s crews earned two advances to the final races in the weekend event, in the varsity-four, and freshman-eight categories. Conditions were so poor that several races were rescheduled during the day and five races, including four Saturday women’s events, were cancelled.
The varsity-four shell ultimately placed third, trailing Penn State University and Villanova, while the freshman-eight boat finished second in its petite final race with a time of 7:46.4, two seconds faster than the slowest boat in the grand final event, Holy Cross. The eighth-place overall finish was again slower than that of Princeton, which defeated Georgetown on April 1 at a combined meet with Columbia and Rutgers.
Sunday, the lightweight men’s team again competed in Camden, N.J., against traditional Ivy League rival Harvard as well as Rutgers and Delaware. Harvard came out on top, winning three of the four races.
The only first-place finish of the weekend came from the men’s freshman-eight, which won by 7.3 seconds over Delaware. Harvard finished in third place, nearly 10 seconds off the winning pace.
The freshman win is a bright spot for a Hoya rowing team that has been consistently defeated by Ivy League competition this year, most recently at the hands and oars of Cornell. Harvard won all of the varsity races by a considerable margin, taking first and second varsity-eight races by 11.5 and 8.7 seconds, respectively.
In the second freshman-eight race, as well, the only competition was between Harvard’s two boats. The Crimson shells crossed the finish line within five seconds of each other while the Delaware Blue Hens were 20 seconds slower than the winning pace. Georgetown did not enter a boat.
The heavyweight men did not need to venture far; the GWU Invitational could be seen from the Kennedy Center and the upper floors of the Southwest Quadrangle.
Against the perennial power of the U.S. Naval Academy, Georgetown placed well, beating Navy in the freshman-eight race – but only by 0.6 seconds.
Navy controlled the regatta for the rest of the day, winning every race. Georgetown’s men did put up a fight, however: In their three second-place finishes they were only a combined 11.4 seconds slower than Navy’s pace.
The close races are deja vu for the Georgetown heavyweights, who lost three close races to Cornell at last week’s regatta by a combined seven seconds.
The lightweight men meet Navy next Saturday in Annapolis, Md., while the heavyweight women will row at the George Washington University Class of 1998 Cup in Washington, D.C.
