M. heavyweights top Harvard, Brown to retake No. 1 in East

With Harvard, Brown and Princeton trading places at the top of the Eastern Association of Rowing Colleges rankings throughout this year, the men's heavyweight Grand Final was almost certain to be among the most exciting races of yesterday's Sprints.

Princeton wanted no part of the excitement, however.

The Tigers broke away from the Bears and Crimson 500 meters into yesterday's final and never looked back, taking the Sprints title by three seconds over second place Harvard. Brown, which was ranked No. 1 entering the weekend, finished a surprising fourth, as Northeastern crossed the line one-hundreth of a second ahead of the Bears to take third place.

Adjusting to Mother Nature

A strong tailwind made the race conditions very fast, circumstances that were familiar to the Tigers after losing to Brown in just such a breeze last weekend. As team captain Mark Flickinger explained, however, the Tigers spent the week after that loss adjusting their race plan to better accomodate a tailwind.

In conjunction with those adjustments, the Tigers also made sure to get out to a quick start. In last week's loss, they allowed the Bears to get too far ahead in the early going and never recovered.

"Everyone refocused on what we wanted to do [last week]," Flickinger said. "We made an effort to really attack that first 500 meters."

Breaking Free

The Tigers were even with the other boats 500 meters into the race when they made their first move. 300 meters later, they made another major push, and then another just over 1000 meters into the race.

With that, the Tigers had broken clear of the field into open water. Once in command, they sprinted to the finish to hold off all other competitors. Harvard made a small push near the end to gain a few seats, but Princeton would not fold. The Tigers finished the 2000 meter course in five minutes, 31.45 seconds, re-establishing themselves as the best heavyweight eight on the East Coast.

Princeton's second varsity eight came up a bit short in the Grand Final, finishing fourth behind first-place Wisconsin, Brown and Northeastern. The Tigers finished in 5:47.61, nine seconds behind the Badgers.

Showing signs that Princeton might be able to repeat this year's performance, the freshman eight finished second. Harvard took first.

Now that they have beaten the best of the East, the Tigers have to again refocus to take on competition from the west coast. They have three weeks to practice before the IRA National Championships May 31-June 2.