Gill Coed National Championship Semi-Finals, Day Two

Yesterday was the last day of the college sailing coed national championship semi-finals, hosted by St. Mary's College of Maryland. The top 36 sailing teams competed for 18 spots in the championship finals, which began this morning at 9:30. The 36 teams are divided into two fleets of 18 teams, Western and Eastern Semi-Final groups, and the top nine from each fleet will make up the 18 teams who will compete in the finals today.

 Jun 4, 2014; St. Mary's City, MD, USA; Day Two of the semi-finals of the GILL Coed National Championship held at the College of St. Mary's in St. Mary's City, MD. Credit: Brian Schneider/www.ebrianschneider.com

Racing began at 9:30 a.m. yesterday with winds from the northwest at about 5-10 knots. The winds slowly died around 12:30 p.m. and after completing two races in each division in each fleet, the sailors waited on shore for the wind to fill in. By around 3 p.m. the sailors were back on the course to start racing. A southerly breeze around 5-7 knots filled in and remained pretty steady until around 4:15 p.m., when it lightened up again and became patchy on the race course. The sailors started to rotate boats on the water rather than from the dock to try and squeeze in as many races as possible.

The deadline for racing was 5 p.m., so the race officials got in as much racing as the conditions would allow. The Eastern Semi-Final completed four races in A-division and B-division for a total of six races for the event. The Western Semi-Final completed three races in A-division and B-division for a total of five races for the event.

Yale University won the Western fleet, not placing out of the top four in either division. The sailors had prepared for light and patchy conditions. “We like this stuff,” says Bill Healy, assistant coach for Yale. “We have a great spot to practice in any conditions [at Yale]. We tucked in close to shore to prepare,” Healy says.

 Jun 4, 2014; St. Mary's City, MD, USA; Day Two of the semi-finals of the GILL Coed National Championship held at the College of St. Mary's in St. Mary's City, MD. Credit: Brian Schneider/www.ebrianschneider.com

Connecticut College overtook Georgetown University and won the Eastern fleet. They moved up from second place Tuesday, one point behind Georgetown, to one point ahead of them yesterday.

Mike Callahan, head coach for Georgetown said even his best sailors had trouble yesterday, but their focus is on the finals. “We are disappointed we did not win this regatta, but we will take lessons from it and focus on the finals – we will be racing in the hardest fleet of the year tomorrow with the top 18 teams in the nation,” says Callahan.

The US Sailing Grit Award is awarded to the teams who qualified for the finals in ninth place in each semi-final fleet; yesterday's recipients were the University of Wisconsin at Madison and Boston College.

The scoreboard is wiped clean for the Gill Coed National Championship Finals today. The first warning for racing was at 9:30 a.m. The top 18 teams will be competing for the national title and the Henry A. Morss Memorial Trophy over the next two days.

Final Nine Teams Eastern Semi-Final:
1. Connecticut College, 48
2. Georgetown University, 49
3. College of Charleston, 64
4. Stanford University, 73*
5. U.S. Naval Academy, 73*
6. Dartmouth College, 74
7. Tufts University, 78
8. U.S. Coast Guard Academy, 80
9. University of Wisconsin, 105
*Number of high place (1) finishes

Sailing for Connecticut College is: Kevin Martland '14 with Lea Bushnell '15 in A-division and IG Schottlaender '14 with Kim Bolick '15 in B-division.

Sailing for Georgetown is: Nevin Snow '16 with Katia DaSilva '15 in A-division and Alex Post '15 with Bettina Redway '16 in B-division.

 Jun 4, 2014; St. Mary's City, MD, USA; Day Two of the semi-finals of the GILL Coed National Championship held at the College of St. Mary's in St. Mary's City, MD. Credit: Brian Schneider/www.ebrianschneider.com

Final Nine Teams Western Semi-Final:
1. Yale University, 19
2. Old Dominion University, 54*
3. Bowdoin College, 54*
4. St. Mary’s College of Maryland, 55
5. University of Hawaii, 60
6. University of South Florida, 63
7. Harvard University, 68**
8. Brown University, 68**
9. Boston College, 75
*Number of high place (1) finishes
**Head-to-head tiebreaker

Sailing for Yale is: Graham Landy '15 with Katherine Gaumond '15 in A-division and Ian Barrows '17 with Meredith Megarry '17 and Marlena Fauer '14 in B-division.

Sailing for Old Dominion is: Esteban Forrer '16 with Julia Wiesner '14 in A-division and Andrea Luna '15 with Chloe Constants '14 in B-division.