Sailing: Team thrives in the water

Though intercollegiate sailing is purported to have been founded at Princeton sometime in the 19th century, according to junior John Wetenhall, it’s been a long time since the club team has been a varsity program.

“The program used to be really good,” Wetenhall said, who began sailing his freshman year after joining the team on a whim. “But over the years, we started to fall off, and eventually we ended up becoming a club sport.” Wetenhall is also a sports writer for The Daily Princetonian.

While silverware and national championships are a thing of the past, the 25-member squad still regularly competes and performs well in regional regattas. In fact, last weekend, it took second place at the Central Qualifier regatta at its home course in Perth Amboy, N.J., qualifying in the process for America’s Trophy, a regatta that features some of the best sailing schools in the Northeast.

“Qualifying for America’s Trophy is really important to the team. It’s a good way for us to place well in one regatta while getting a berth in another, our most competitive event,” freshman Gene Merewether said. “We’re proud of the way we organized the regatta this weekend and of how we placed.”

The two-day Central Qualifier regatta featured seven teams from the Mid-Atlantic region, including Penn and in-state rival Ocean County College. Princeton brought an “A” boat, skippered by senior Allison Tracy and crewed by Wetenhall, and a “B” boat, skippered by Merewether and crewed by sophomore Catie Bartlett.

The teams competed in a total of 11 races, each lasting roughly 20 minutes, on a quarter-nautical-mile course. Each race consisted of all seven boats racing at once. Teams received points based on their places in each race.

By the end of the first day, despite some strong currents in Perth Amboy harbor, Princeton had established solid control over third place and was only a point behind second after seven races.

“Where we sail, there are two rivers coming into the ocean, so you can actually see the dividing line between two currents because they’re so strong,” Wetenhall explained. “We had one race where we had a bad start, but because we played the current right, we went from last to first after the first leg.”

While the weather on Saturday was ideal for sailing, Sunday’s weather was another story: The early morning, low-hanging fog delayed the start of the races, causing the teams to race only four times, instead of the originally planned seven races.

Still, Princeton overcame this early setback to finish second by a three-point margin and qualify for America’s Trophy.

It was a vindictive moment for a squad that has been racing since February — Princeton failed to qualify last year despite regularly making it past this stage in previous years.

For Tracy, in particular, this regatta was poignant because it was her last.

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“I’m sad because college sailing has such a nice community,” she said. “I had such a good time, and it was nice to end my career on a high note.”

America’s Trophy, which will take place at Cornell next weekend, will feature a number of the region’s powerhouses, including Georgetown, Navy and the Merchant Marine, who “always do well,” according to Tracy.

From this regatta, the top eight of the 20 participating schools qualify for a final regional regatta before the national championships.

Merewether predicted that most schools will have a difficult time dealing with the weather conditions on Cornell’s course.

“The Cornell sailing site often has very light wind, because it’s on a lake, which can make sailing pretty frustrating and intense,” he said.

“I’m setting a goal for my crew and myself to try to place in the top 10 against the other boats in the “A” division, which contributes half of the score for the Princeton team at that regatta.”

The squad expects to face top-tier competition in the regatta.

“It’s going to be very difficult to be in the top group,” Wetenhall said. “We just want to do well, but no matter what, our season won’t be over because we’ll still be able to go to consolation regattas.”

Still, Tracy said the team should approach the regatta with quiet confidence and an eye for learning. “It’s always a fun competition,” she said. “It’s very difficult, but we can still learn from our opponents and use the tricks we’ve seen in this regatta when we’re facing easier competition.”