Yale Athletics

The Bulldogs stayed focused on the windy Charles River this weekend, winning the Marchiando Team race despite shifty conditions.

The Marchiando Cup marked the Bulldogs’ last weekend before the New England qualifiers in Providence, Rhode Island. The sailors in Boston faced windy conditions but still pulled out a first-place finish against notable teams such as Brown University and Tufts University. The win boosted the team’s morale going into the most challenging and important part of the season. 

“I feel myself, along with the rest of the team, performed very well this weekend,” said Jack Egan ’25. “For me personally, each weekend my crew and I are getting more and more in sync and performing better and better.”

Egan races with Nathan Sih ’25 and Catherine Cheung ’24, and both members of his crew helped him deal with the shifty wind conditions during the competition. 

The difference in wind velocity throughout the day made it hard for the team to stay consistent in all their races. Egan commented on the increased competition due to this “significant aspect of randomness.”

“In these conditions, significant emphasis is placed on the crew to keep the boat going as fast as possible, and our crews are some of the best, so I attribute this win to our crews,” Egan said.

Saturday marked a slow start because of the lack of wind, but in the mid-afternoon, there was a full round of round-robin sailing. The following day, significant oscillations in the wind made the balancing and overall maneuvering of the boats much more taxing. However, the Bulldogs stayed undefeated all day on Sunday, placing above second-place Brown, who had four overall losses. 

The Bulldogs had only one loss, which was to Tufts, throughout the weekend of races. 

“Jack and I were able to sail fast and smart, allowing us to only have one loss all weekend, with a final dominating Yale score of 13 wins and one loss,” said Sih, Egan’s crew member.

Fellow northeastern schools Harvard University and Roger Williams University were not in the same division as Yale at the Marchiando Team race. For this reason, Sih said he is “excited” to face these competitors this weekend at the New England Intercollegiate Sailing Association team race championships.

The women’s team has also been producing results while racing against their Rhode Island competitors.

At the Dellenbaugh Women’s Team Race this weekend, the Yale women’s sailing team took second behind fellow NEISA competitor and rival Brown.

“At this point in the season, we’re looking to build consistency,” skipper Emma Cowles ’25 told Yale Athletics. “It was definitely a necessity in the shifty conditions at Brown. Saturday had lighter and very shifty winds, while Sunday had much heavier winds. Overall as a team, we are happy with our performance.”

The women’s team will return to the water at the Yale Women’s Team Race in Branford next weekend as they try to get back to their winning ways.

“There is still room for improvement, but we have shown that we are one of the strong NEISA teams,” Megan Grimes ’24 said. 

Both teams are heading into crunch time as the New England Team Race Championships come up for the women and the NEISA Team Race Championship comes up for the team racers. 

All of Yale Sailing is looking to end their season on a solid note at the ICSA Open Team Race National Championships at the end of April.