While rough conditions caused the races for the four-person shells and small boats to be called off at the Princeton Chase yesterday, the Cornell crews were able send their varsity eights out on the water in Princeton, N.J.
The men’s lightweight crew saw its B boat row off with a first-place showing, while the men’s heavyweights had a top finish of fourth-place. The women’s crew had a difficult weekend, as one boat was forced to drop out of the race due to equipment problems and another came in 20th.
[img_assist|nid=19300|title=Making waves|desc=Cornell’s crews continued to show improvement, racing at the the Princeton Chase this past weekend. (Eric Safstrom / Sun Senior Photographer)|link=popup|align=left|width=100|height=50]
The men’s lightweight B boat (14:25.74) surprised everyone with its first-place finish, crossing the line just ahead of Navy (14:25.91), and beating the Red’s varsity boat by about 10 seconds.
The A boat improved upon its performance after competing at the Head of the Charles in Boston last weekend and finishing sixth behind Princeton, Navy, Penn, Georgetown, and Columbia among the college teams. This weekend, however, the Red came back strong to beat every one of these teams, except Navy, and finish fourth overall.
The B boat, coxed by junior Pat Little, battled through a tight fit during its race. There was one bridge in the course where the boats had to pass through an archway which allowed for only three boats. The B boat reached the archway along with three other boats and therefore had to maneuver in order to avoid a collision or penalty. Due to its boat being the fastest and consequently gaining the right of way, the team was not penalized as two of the other boats collided and the Red went on through to win the race. The lightweight C boat had a similarly impressive race and beat all of the other C teams except Princeton, finishing 12th overall.
“We had by far the best lightweight results out of all the schools. The Chase results were definitely a great way to end the fall season, but the spring season is what really matters and we still have some work to do,” said senior John Ackerman.
The men’s heavyweight boats finished fourth, sixth, and 19th overall. The heavyweight team also improved on their results from the Princeton Chase last year. Last year, the heavyweight team finished eighth, 17th, and 31st. This year, however, the A boat finished fourth, the B boat beat all of the other B boats, and the C boat beat all except one C boat. The results also illustrate the depth of the heavyweight squad.
“The Chase definitely showed that the team is getting faster and making improvements every day and every week. We’re looking forward to the spring season where you go head to head and it gets a little more personal,” said senior David Gevurtz.
