After a shortened summer break due to the extended spring season into June for championship racing, the Nation’s third-fastest heavyweight crew team returned to Ithaca, along with the women’s and lightweight teams. Having been training since the start of the fall semester, Cornell has been able to log two races before this past weekend. The first was a four-mile race in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., with the lightweights and women bringing home gold medals. The second race was in Rochester, N.Y., two weekends ago with the women again claiming the gold.

This past Saturday Cornell sent its top 20 rowers, along with their three best coxswains, to Boston, Mass., to compete in the Head of The Charles Regatta (HOCR). The HOCR is the world’s largest two-day regatta, hosting over 8,900 athletes competing in 55 events. The event classes range from youth (under 18) through senior veteran singles (60+), from single scullers through coxed eights, and featured skill levels from novice club through elite Olympic athletes. The head race is organized in such a way that all the competitors for an event gather in the basin of the Charles River (near the Mass. Ave bridge) and, according to their start number, cross the start line and race to the finish with each boat separated by roughly 10 seconds. The crews race upriver (there’s a dam at the end so it does not flow much) 3.2 miles to the finish line, passing under six bridges and taking more than five large turns.

Cornell was represented by a coxed eight from the men’s heavyweight squad, a coxed four from the women’s team and a coxed eight from the men’s lightweight crew. 

Going into the weekend, the teams were anxious yet excited. The weekend before they had all raced in Rochester, NY.; while the women came away with a win, the men were outmatched by Brown’s slick rowing, losing a 9,500-meter cumulative race by just over three seconds. The event was comprised of a 5K race and a 1.5K sprint, with the winner being determined by the fastest sum of the 5K time plus the 1.5K time multiplied by three.

Boston’s curvy Charles River is known for bad weather during the HOCR weekend, notably last year when softball-sized snowflakes were falling as the men’s heavyweight Varsity Eight was waiting for the start of the race. As the crews rolled in on Saturday there was a stiff headwind for crews racing up the course, but the sun was out and the weather was far more pleasant than years prior. As Sunday (race day for the Cornell crews) rolled around, the weather was looking perfect. In fact, this past Sunday, 13 course records were broken out of the 24 events raced that day.

The first Cornell boat to race was the women’s coxed four in the championship event. Starting in second place, the women overtook bow No. 1 soon after the start and had gained a respectable margin on the next boat by the first mile marker. Posting the fastest times through all three time markers on the race course, the women came away with more gold medals, finishing in 17:48.071.

The second Cornell crew to take the water was the men’s heavyweight squad, again in the Championship race. There was a last-minute switch in personnel in this boat, as one of the key rowers came down with an illness just the day before leaving campus for the race. That said, the boat that left Ithaca on Saturday morning had only rowed together once prior to racing at the HOCR. Starting in 13th place, as a result of last year’s showing, the team was eager to prove its strength after last weekend’s defeat. With only three collegiate crews going faster than them, the Cornell Heavies proved their power, finishing sixth behind Washington, Harvard, Cal, the U.S. national team and the Dutch national team, and crossing the finish in 14:17.639 –– only 17 seconds behind first place.

The final Cornell race was in the lightweight men’s eight. After finishing just behind the Heavies the weekend before, the lightweights were ready to pick on someone their own size coming into the HOCR. Starting with bow No. 6 the Cornell Lights flew down the racecourse, claiming the silver medal in 14:22.836. Princeton’s lightweights claimed the gold this year, in addition to the course record.

Despite their great showing this past weekend all three crews started the week off training hard for their next race at Princeton, where they will again race some of the fastest crews in the country.

In other Cornell Rowing news, three alums represent the U.S. at the world championships this upcoming Halloween weekend.