Despite varying results on the water this weekend, all four Georgetown crew teams showed marked improvement from previous weeks with the heavyweight men winning and the lightweight men and women finishing second to national caliber crews.
The lightweight men won just one of their four races, while the heavyweight men split with Yale and Rutgers. On the women’s side, the heavyweight women finished seventh at the Big East championships and the lightweights beat Ohio State but fell to Wisconsin.
Though the lightweight men’s team lost a tough 3-1 regatta against Columbia on Mercer Lake, Coach John Fife said, “This was a big improvement from the last couple of races.probably our best races so far [this year].”
Both Georgetown and Columbia fought a tight varsity-eight race as the boats traded leads with Georgetown winning the first 1000 meters, but the Columbia shell resurging to overtake the Hoyas in the last 1000 for the victory, The Hoyas fell by less than five seconds.
The second varsity-eight race would be a different story as the Georgetown boat led the entire race on its way to a seven-second win and a finish time of 6:47.06 in the less than ideal rowing conditions. The win, according to Fife, was tangible proof that the team has made improvements thus far into the season.
“We’re obviously happy with the second varsity win,” Fife said. “In this race we finally put a lot of pieces together and really raced well – we finally transferred over a lot of the stuff we’ve been working on in practice and finally bringing it into a race.”
The race against Columbia was a good test for the lightweight men as the Lions consistently sport one of the nation’s top crew programs. More important than the results, though, was that according to Fife, “This was a good preparation for the Eastern Sprints, our championship race. Now we have three weeks to train and build on this momentum for that race.”
Meanwhile, the heavyweight men saw action in two regattas – against Yale on Saturday at Mercer Lake and against Rutgers on Sunday in New Brunswick, N.J.
The Hoyas lost 3-0 to Yale, with their closest finish in the varsity-eight race. The shell finished in 6:22.68, 3.4 seconds slower than Yale’s boat.
In the novice-eight, Georgetown was only six seconds behind Yale’s A team pace of 6:42.6 but did defeat Yale’s B team by nearly twelve seconds. The regatta was an improvement from previous weeks’ with Georgetown hot on Yale’s pace for most of the races.
The lightweight men will next row in the Eastern Sprints Championship on May 21 against other teams from the mid-Atlantic region.
Against Rutgers on the Raritan River, the heavyweight men ran the table, winning 3-0 in several close races, namely the second varsity-eight and the freshman-eight clashes.
The second-varsity was a close affair the whole way through with Georgetown and Rutgers in a fight for the finish. In the final strokes, the Hoyas pulled away for a one-second victory and a finish time of 6:23.0.
After such a close race, the freshman-eight kept things interesting, putting together an even closer win over a talented Scarlet Knights crew, rowing neck and neck the entire way for a photo finish worthy result of 6:18.4 to 6:18.7.
Heavyweight men row on Sunday against George Washington on the Potomac in their last dual meet of the year before championship races begin.
The heavyweight women took a trip to Worcester, Mass. over the weekend where they faced the cream of the Big East crop at the conference championships. Notre Dame defended its Big East title by amassing 122 total points and winning four race finals.
Georgetown won the novice-four championship and finished in seventh place overall with 47 points, ahead of only Villanova (45 points) and West Virginia (21 points).
.Georgetown will now have two weeks to prepare for the Eastern Sprints championships, their final meet of the year that will pit them against top teams from the region.
Meanwhile the lightweight women stayed close to home over the weekend; they raced Wisconsin and Ohio State Saturday on the Potomac. Race conditions were favorable; there was a 12 mph tailwind to go along with a tail-current and pleasant weather.
Wisconsin swept the three race event while Ohio State’s only entry finished third in the varsity-eight with a time of 6:27.4, six seconds slower than Georgetown and almost 20 seconds slower than Wisconsin’s winning time of 6:08.9. Georgetown finished in second place.
The lightweight women will next find their way to Camden, N.J. on May 14 where they will row in the Eastern Sprints championships before racing in the IRA championships on June 2 and 3.
