St. Mary's Wins National Sailing Team Racing Championship
Courtesy of St. Mary's College of Maryland Office of
Public & Media Relations
Contacts: Marc Apter, 240-895-4381; Katie Lanham,
240-895-4191
Madison, Wis. - Over the extended Memorial
Day weekend, the top 14 schools in the nation – as determined
by their performance in one of the seven Inter-Collegiate Sailing
Association conferences to which they belong – were in
America's Heartland racing for the 2010 ICSA/APS Team Race National
Championship title on Lake Mendota. For one team, St. Mary's
College of Maryland, it was a reversal of fortune from 2009 when
the Seahawks lost this championship on a tie breaker, to come back
and win this year's contest on a tie break with the same team
– Boston College. Proving that they are a powerhouse in
this format of sailing, the win marks the fifth time the Seahawks
have clinched this unique championship which pits each college's
three-boat team against another's in a round-robin series of
matches.
The competition starts with the 14 teams divided into two groups;
the first hurdle for the teams was finishing top four in their
group. In Group 1, St. Mary's (6-0), Tufts (5-1), Yale (4-2)
and College of Charleston (4-2) moved on to the Gold Round.
Northwestern University (2-4), Texas A&M Galveston (1-5) and
the University of Hawaii (0-6) were out of contention for the
national title at the conclusion of that round.
From Group 2, Boston College (6-0), Georgetown University (5-1),
the U.S. Naval Academy (4-2) and the University of Wisconsin (3-3)
progressed to the Gold Round, while Eckerd College (1-5), Stanford
University (2-4) and the University of Washington (0-6) were also
out of contention.
At the conclusion of the Gold Round, also known as the “elite
eight,” the “final four“ race to determine the
champion. The goal of the championship is to have the top
four teams meet each other three times, which also allows for a tie
break. This year's event was a light air contest, and credit
goes to the Race Committee for giving the sailors every opportunity
to get races completed especially on the penultimate day of the
championship (Sunday, May 30) when competitors were out sailing at
9 a.m. and finishing up about 8 p.m.
“When teams make the 'elite eight,' each team is capable of
beating everyone else,” explained Adam
Werblow, head varsity sailing coach at St. Mary's
College. “There is no easy win. Every team has
worked damn hard to get here and they've accomplished a lot by the
time they get to the championship round. That's what makes it
fun. There are simply no gimmes once you get into the elite
eight.”
“In the first day, we were undefeated,” said senior skipper Ted Hale (Annapolis, Md). “We didn't fare quite as well on the second day, but we were still in the lead. By the time of the final four, the air was light. You had to keep your mind in the right place and keep calm. Every race in that last day was really close. There were no blow-outs.” Having graduated in May, this is Hale's last college race, making it an even more special occasion as the Seahawks have not won the championship since 2007.
“What helped us is that we have a team who has worked
together for a very long time,” said
Werblow. “This team has been
perfecting the skills of team racing and Bill Ward (varsity sailing
coach) has been exceptional on coaching the details of how to team
race well. The level of consistency that they've had is
remarkable. With the support of our alumni we set the bar
really high and we had a goal at the beginning of the year to win
this championship.”
“Team racing is a lot like a chess game,” said senior crew Kelly Wilbur (Ipswich, Mass.). “There is a lot more strategy in team racing than in any other form of collegiate racing. To get this championship it took all 30 members of the sailing team.” Wilbur, who has been racing since she was four years old, discussed how much it meant to have St. Mary's College alumni cheering from the sidelines: “I was so excited to have my parents at the race. There were also tons of alumni in a Seahawks cheering section, which meant a lot to the team. We could hear them as we left the dock.”
On the water for St. Mary's were Hale with junior
crew Franny
Kupersmith (Alexandria, Va.), junior skipper
Michael
Menninger (Newport Harbor, Calif.) with
Wilbur and senior skipper Jesse
Kirkland (Warwick, Bermuda) with junior crew
Maddie
Jackson (Bainbridge Island, Wash.). For
the last race of the championship, senior skipper Mike
Kuschner (San Francisco, Calif.) sailed with
Kupersmith, and Hale sailed with
Wilbur.
“We have such a proud tradition and we are thrilled to be
able to represent the school and one another,” summed up
Werblow. “There are 30 kids on our
team and 2,000 in the school. The 10 kids sailing here are
representing the rest and feel really proud to regain the national
title we covet so much.”
Final standings for the final four: St. Mary's 12-5, Boston
College 12-5, Georgetown 10-7 and Charleston 9-8. Complete
results are available at: http://2010nationals.collegesailing.org/page/Team-Race-Results
St. Mary's College has a long history of sailing championships. SMCM won the 2009 ICSA/GILL Co-ed National Dinghy Sailing Championship in San Francisco, the Superbowl of intercollegiate sailing. This marked the third time in program history that St. Mary's College had captured the Co-ed Dinghy National Championship. Since 1993, the college has won 15 national sailing championships and produced more than 100 ICSA All-American sailors.
St. Mary's College of Maryland, designated the Maryland state honors college in 1992, is ranked one of the best liberal arts schools in the nation by U.S. News & World Report, Kiplinger's, and The Princeton Review. Founded in 1840 as Maryland's “monument school” commemorating the state's first capital, SMCM is the state's only public honors college.
More than 2,000 students attend the college, which has the highest graduation rate for all Maryland public colleges and universities. The school's waterfront campus along the St. Mary's River in Southern Maryland is home to the 2010 National Intercollegiate Sailing Association Team-racing champions.
Editor's note: The attached photo of St. Mary's College of Maryland's Michael Menninger with Kelly Wilbur, is free for editorial, with use of the title 2010 ICSA/APS Team Race National Championship, and photo credit to GTSphotos.com.
