Fresh from a week of sailing in Florida, the Polar Bears returned to chilly New England to post strong results in Boston and Newport last weekend. The coed squad placed fourth of 16 at the Southern Series at Salve Regina, and the women's team placed fifth of 15 in the Central Series at BU, just ahead of a second coed squad in seventh.
The entire team spent five days last week training on the warm waters of Biscayne Bay at Ransom Everglades School in Miami, Fla.
An abundance of wind made for long and productive days on the water, and head coach Frank Pizzo praised his team for across-the-board improvement and depth of talent.
A fire at Miami International Airport led to canceled flights and snarled logistics for the team, but the sailors were able to compete in all their scheduled events, posting strong scores across all three squads.
When the Polar Bears arrived in Newport, they were greeted by temperatures in the 20s and brisk and building breeze in Newport harbor, a far cry from Miami. Captain D.J. Hatch '11 and crew Mae Speight '13 led the team with two wins in A division and eight top-three placements to finish fourth in A.
Notably, the duo finished no lower than third on Sunday, benefitting from lighter breeze and some sunshine. Pizzo was particularly proud of Pete Edmunds '14 and Kim Dempsey '14, who earned second place in B division, posting very impressive scores, including two wins and no placements lower than sixth in the entire weekend of racing.
"We tried not to overcomplicate anything," said Edmunds. "We took each part of the races one step at a time with clear and simple goals."
Sailors in Boston experienced similar conditions on the Charles River, based off a dock that the regatta report calls "one of the coldest places on earth."
This did not phase the eight Polar Bear sailors, who bundled up and sailed fast. The women's team was lead by captain Coco Sprague '11 and crew Isabel Low '13, who placed fourth in A division.
The women's B sailors, Sarah Fiske '13 and Emily McNeil '14 stood out, placing fifth in B division despite McNeil's relative inexperience as a crew, having only taken on that position in the previous week in Miami. McNeil came to Bowdoin as a skipper. The duo's scores improved consistently during the regatta.
"It was difficult to transition from Miami to FJs [a different boat than the team sailed in Miami] and a much shiftier venue," said Fiske, "but we eventually keyed into the shifts and puffs and definitely benefitted from the practice we had the week before. It was incredibly cold, but we did a good job pumping each other up, and having two teams there definitely made it easier!"
The second team at BU was Tom Peabody '14 and Ayaka Okawa '14 in A division, and experienced crews Ben Berg '12 and Leah Hughes '11 in B division, coming off a win in the Crews Regatta in the fall. Against much stiffer competition, Berg and Hughes placed eighth in B division, with Peabody and Okawa seventh in A.
The sailing team showed incredible depth with these results, as many of the scheduled starters for both events were unable to sail due to flight cancellations out of Miami.
The team will return to BU and Salve Regina next weekend for the BU Trophy and Southern Series 3, gearing up for New England Dinghy Championships, April 16 and 17 in Rhode Island.