Thursday, November 17, 2011

College Sailing: A Q&A with West Coast Sailors

By Kelly Stannard

This week I sat down with two of my teammates at Roger Williams University from the West Coast and they discussed what it was like growing up sailing in the Pacific. I also picked their brains about the differences between East Coast and West Coast style sailing. Meet Annie Schmidt (Sophomore / San Francisco, Calif.)
and George Saunders (Senior / San Diego, Calif.).

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

A College Sailor's Life: A Win at ACC’s to Finish my Senior Fall

By: Kelly Stannard

This weekend marked the conclusion of the fall dinghy season in college sailing. Three of the biggest fall fleet races were on the line at the Pacific Coast Championship (PCC), the Women’s Atlantic Coast Championship (WACC), and the Atlantic Coast Championship (ACC).

At the PCC’s, the schools on the west coast battled it out and Stanford came out on top with Cal. Santa Barbra second and Southern Cal placing third.

The WAA’s hosted by New York Maritime had some extremely tight racing and it came down to a tie breaker between the University of Rhode Island and Yale. Yale won the tie-breaker to win the event. In third place and only one point behind the top two was Dartmouth.

The ACC’s were hosted by Harvard, where I was competing this weekend for Roger Williams University. And yes, the Hawk’s won! I couldn’t think of a better way to finish off my senior year fall season. All of my teammates sailed extremely well this weekend and our Coach, Colin Merrick insisted that we, “Stay focused ALL weekend”. This motto seemed to work out well for us and we were able to stay as consistent as we could on the shifty Charles River winning overall by 43 points. Sailing A division was Sean Bouchard, our “heavy” Jake Bartlein, and me. We finished 6th. Our B division really kept us in the running all weekend. They won their division by 20 points. Sailing in B was, Alec Anderson, Sophie Bellacosa and Tyler Wilson.
Dartmouth finished second and Brown finished up second and third.

It was a beautiful weekend with warmer than anticipated weather, even though I still wore my drysuit and a neckwarmer both days! The season is over. Time to roll up my drysuit, hang up my boots, pack away the bailer and get some homework done before the spring season comes around.

Thursday, November 10, 2011

A College Sailor's Life: A Little Bit for Everyone

By Kelly Stannard


College Racing

This coming weekend will wrap-up the fall dinghy season. On the schedule is the Co-ed Atlantic Coast Championship for the 38th Fiske-Harriman-Sleigh Trophies hosted by Harvard University, the Women’s Atlantic Coast Championship hosted by New York Maritime and the 2011 Pacific Coast Championship hosted by the University of California Santa Barbara. These events are the last big “hoorah” for fall dingy racing. Some even compare the caliber of competition to the spring dingy nationals.

Teams competing at the Women’s Atlantic Coast Championship: Georgetown, Hobart & William Smith Colleges, U.S. Naval Academy, Cornell, SUNY Maritime College, St. Mary’s College of Maryland, Old Dominion, Dartmouth, Rhode Island, Connecticut College, Brown, Yale, Bowdoin, Vermont, Tufts, Eckerd, College of Charleston, South Florida

Teams competing at the Atlantic Coast Championship (co-ed): Georgetown, St. Mary's College of Maryland, Hobart and William Smith Colleges, Old Dominion, U.S. Naval Academy, SUNY Maritime College, U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, Penn, Dartmouth, Harvard, Yale, Brown, Roger Williams, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Tufts, College of Charleston, Miami (Fla.), South Florida

Teams competing at the Pacific Coast Championship: Oregon, Washington, Western Washington, Arizona State, California Maritime Academy, Cal. State - Channel Islands, Long Beach State, Cal. State - Monterey Bay, Chapman, Santa Clara, Stanford, UC Berkeley, UC Davis, UC Irvine, UCLA, UC San Diego, UC Santa Barbara, UC Santa Cruz, Hawaii, Southern California

You can follow the results of these events on TechScore.

Fitness Surprises

So I can’t speak for all the college sailing teams and their fitness routines but at Roger Williams we have weekly workouts and usually once a month our coach slaps us with a fitness test. Tuesday morning I was expecting to have a fun team workout, you know something like indoor soccer, for our last week of the season but that would be too nice. Instead, while I was half asleep and just stumbled to the gym I was greeted with the “nice” surprise of our final fitness test of the year… Fabulous!

Our fitness test includes, a timed two mile run (if you can’t run for whatever reason you compete for distance for 20 minutes on a bike), maximum rep push-ups and sit-ups, and a timed wall-sit. Our times and numbers are then graded against the U.S. Army scoring system. For example, to receive a 100% in our age category you must complete 80 sit ups (no one holds your feet, arms crossed, sit ALL the way up).  I was glad to get this last fitness test out of the way even though I wasn’t ecstatic about the 7 a.m. surprise.

I was curious. What do other college teams do for their fitness? Do you have a fitness test? 

Please share.


Other News

I’d like to ask all of you if you’ve voted for the US Sailing's 2011 Rolex Yachtsman & Yachtswoman of the Year Awards? These two awards are the most prestigious awards in the country for sailing. The people who win these awards are the sailors you race against, the ones who you follow their results, and the ones you race against every weekend. If you haven’t taken the time to nominate someone, think about it and send in your nomination. The awards go to sailor’s who have had outstanding results throughout the calendar year, so if someone instantly pops into your thoughts it probably means they are worthy of a nomination. Give your peers some recognition. More info here..

Who do you think deserves these awards?

Monday, November 7, 2011

A College Sailor's Life: New National Champs!

By: Kelly Stannard

Lots of racing took place around the conferences this weekend. Most notably the Men’s and Women’s Singlehanded National Championships were held in Chicago.

After the first four races of day one in Chicago, junior Cam Cullman from Yale and freshman Chris Stocke from University of South Florida (USF) were in the lead followed by junior Colin Smith of Brown for the Men’s Championship. For the Women’s Championship after day one, freshman Mary Hall from
Navy was in first, senior Corey Hall of College of Charleston was in second and senior Anne Haeger of Boston College (BC) who had won the event twice before was in third.

Things got shaken up along the way and after 15 races for both the men and the women, new National Champions were named! Cam Cullman from Yale is the Men’s Singlehanded Champion. Chris Stocke of USF won the tie breaker over senior Zeke Harowitz from Charleston to place second. On the women’s course, senior Annie Haeger of BC, for the third time in four years, is the Women’s Singlehanded National Champion. Junior Claire Dennis from Yale who won the event last year placed second closely followed by her teammate, junior Emily Billing in third.

Congratulations to all the competitors and to Annie and Cam for their victories!

At the Hap Moore Team Race at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, Tufts won the event with a 13-2 record, Boston College placed second with a record of 12-3 and Roger Williams rounded out the top three with an 11-4 record.

At the Freshman Intersectional hosted by Bowdoin (not Connecticut College as I mentioned in my last blog, my mistake), the Tufts Jumbos placed first followed by both University of Vermont teams in second and third.
The SAISA/MAISA event was dominated by the Charleston Cougars. All three Charleston teams made up the top three spots for the event! Go home team!

For full results from these events and other events visit http://scores.collegesailing.info/.
This coming weekend is another big one on the East Coast with the Atlantic Coast Dinghies and Women’s Atlantic Coast Dinghies on the schedule.

Thursday, November 3, 2011

Weekend College Sailing Preview

By Kelly Stannard

I have this weekend off from racing but there are plenty of events happening all over the country. The biggest event of the weekend is the 2011-12 ICSA Men's and Women's Singlehanded National Championships hosted by Chicago Yacht Club. There is the Kennedy Cup, a sloop event, at the U.S. Naval Academy, the Hap Moore Team Race at U.S. Coast Guard, a Team Race Scrimmage on the West Coast at University of California Santa Barbara (UCSB), the SAISA/MAISA at College of Charleston and the Freshmen Intersectional at Connecticut College.

The Singlehanded National Championships bring together 18 of the best men and women singlehanded sailors. All will compete for a national title to bring home to their schools, each has qualified for the event at a conference elimination. Men will sail Lasers and women will sail Laser Radials. I’m predicting it will be a tad bit chilly up in Chicago at this time of year.  Racing starts tomorrow and ends Sunday. Sailors get a chance to do some open-water racing off of Belmont Harbor, the forecast for the weekend has breeze ranges from 5 to 20 knots, but you never know what you’ll get till you’re there. You can follow results on the event page, http://2011singlehanded.collegesailing.info/.

The competition will be stiff at both of these Championships. At the Men’s, junior Cam Cullman from Yale placed third last year, junior Colin Smith of Brown was seventh, junior Chris Barnard of Georgetown placed 10th and senior Sam Blouin of Hobart finished 15th.  Cullman won the NEISA qualifier by more than 50 points. Four of the sailors who placed in the top five at this event last year have graduated leaving the podium open for newcomers to rise to the occasion.

The Women’s Singlehanded Nationals this year will have many of the sailors who competed last year back again to try and win the title. Four of the top five sailors from 2010 are returning, making for some tight and exciting races. Junior Claire Dennis of Yale edged out senior, Annie Haeger of Boston College by one point to win the event last year. In 2009, Haeger of BC won the event while Dennis took second. I’m guessing Haeger will be looking for a re-match against Dennis this year (Haeger’s senior year)! Also placing in the top five last year was sophomore, Arielle DeLisser from Hobart and William Smith who placed third and junior, Emily Billing of Yale who placed fourth.

Other events on the weekend schedule include the Hap Moore team race at Coast Guard where teams from NESIA and MAISA have a chance to get their feet wet with a fall team race. There is the sloop event at Navy where teams from all conferences will be competing in Navy 44’s, some more NEISA and MAISA teams will be throwing down at Charleston, the freshmen will have a chance to shine at the Freshman Intersectional hosted by Connecticut College and some of the West Coast schools will be at the Team Race Scrimmage at UCSB.

If you’re sailing at one of these events or a regatta we didn’t mention let us know how you’re preparing, and what you’re looking forward to!

It should be a busy weekend of high-level college sailing as usual. Which school do you think will win at the Men’s and Women’s Singlehanded Nationals? Add your comments below.

Competitors at Men’s Singlehanded by conference:

MAISA:
John Wallace '14 St. Mary's College of Maryland
Chris Barnard '13 Georgetown University
Samuel Blouin '12 Hobart & Williams Smith
Philip Alley '12 Cornell University

MCSA:
Andrew Fox '13, University of Wisconsin
Joseph Kutschenreuter '12, University of Wisconsin
Harrison Burton '14, University of Minnesota

NEISA:
Cam Cullman '13, Yale University
Colin Smith 13', Brown University
Lucas Adams '15, Brown University
Michael Zonnenberg '15, University of Vermont

NWICSA:
Elliot Drake '12, University of Oregon

PCCSC:
Mateo Vargas '14, Stanford University
Kieran Chung '15, Stanford University

SAISA:
Zeke Horowitz '12, College of Charleston
Christopher Stocke' 15 University of South Florida
David Hernandez '12, University of Miami

SEISA:
Trey Hartman '15, Texas A&M Galveston

Competitors at Women’s Singlehanded by conference:

MAISA:
Arielle DeLisser, Hobart & William Smith
Marissa Lihan U.S. Naval Academy
Giuditta deLaghi Hampton University
Mary Hall U.S. Naval Academy

MCSA:
Lauren-Alyssa Knoles Michigan State University
Ellen Dubois '14, University of Michigan
Natalie Sinn '12, University of Minnesota

NEISA:
Anne Hager '12 Boston College
Claire Dennis '13, Yale University
Emily Billings '13, Yale University
Sky Adams '14, Brown University
Jessica Claflin '13, Brown University

NWICSA:
Erika Vranizan '12 Western Washington University

PCCSC:

Molly McKinney '14, Stanford University
Kaitlyn Baab '15, Stanford University

SAISA:
Corey Hall '12, College of Charleston
Dominique Wright '15 University of South Florida

SEISA:
Rebekka Urbina '12, Texas A&M University Galveston