Bowdoin’s top men’s and women’s crews raced to top ten finishes in the College Fours to cap a great fall season. The Navy had 4 college crews and an alumni boat, and earned 3 guaranteed entries for next year’s regatta.
The First Men zoomed to a 4th place finish and the First Women were 7th for our first 2 guarantees.
The men’s race was extremely close with Bowdoin finishing only 3.4 seconds behind second place Fordham, 1.5 seconds behind Trinity in third, and .5 ahead of Wesleyan, who was just .5 ahead of Cal-Davis! The University of Va. won the event easily. Starting at 26th, Bowdoin passed 4 crews over the course of the race.
The women started 10th and passed Carnegie Mellon and Clemson to finish just 1.5 seconds behind Wheaton (OH) and 3 seconds ahead of Rochester. Washington University bested the field with Hamilton and Middlebury in 2nd and 3rd. The only “B” entry in the event, our Second Women claimed 28th while beating 5 “A” boats to the finish.
Our Second Men raced in the Club Four and finished 35th out of 52, with our alums, the Polar Rowing Club, turning in an 18th place finish and a guarantee for next year.
Andrew Gallagher and Dave Thomas joined former coach Eliot Pitney and current coach Doug Welling, with Ben Needham at the helm in the Polar boat. Hannah Welling, Doug’s wife and former coach at Bowdoin, rowed in the Yarmouth Rowing Club’s master’s four, with Kate Emerson coxing. Tom Scifres coached the Iona men’s four to an 11th in the College Four. Other Bowdoin alums racing included Tyler Lange, whose Marin master’s eight finished 3rd, and Jess Bernier, in the Hudson River RA master’s eight which was 8th.
