Heavyweight Crew Team Sweeps Semifinals to Advance to Grand Finale

Friday, May 28

Trenton, N.J.

Dartmouth College

IRA National Regatta

Photo by: Dartmouth College / Eli Burakian

Heavyweight Crew Team Sweeps Semifinals to Advance to Grand Finale

5/28/2021 6:49:00 PM | Men's Heavyweight Rowing

By: Cindi Mansell

WEST WINDSOR, N.J. — At the end of day, the Dartmouth heavyweight rowing team had every right to be thrilled with their results at the IRA National Championship Regatta on Mercer Lake. Despite choppy water at the start and a cold rain throughout the day, the Big Green had an exceptional day, winning each of their semifinal races to advance to the grand final in the varsity, second varsity and third varsity boats.

The varsity four plus cox, comprised of members of the Big Green lightweight team, will have to wait until tomorrow. While the semifinals were canceled due to adverse wind conditions that made it unsafe for the smaller four-oared shells, Dartmouth will race in the grand final tomorrow morning (weather permitting) having finished the time trials with the fourth-fastest time.

The varsity boat, which finished second to Washington in the time trials, took control in its semifinal race then held off a challenge by a tough Syracuse boat, winning by 3.685 seconds with a time of 6:29.315. Both the Big Green and the Orange qualified for the grand final and were followed by Princeton (6:40.252), Wisconsin (6:43.806), Williams (6:58.206) and Colgate (7:06.942).

In the second varsity eight semifinals, Dartmouth came through with another victory by posting the fastest time across all of the semis (6:21.919), besting Syracuse (6:23.319) once again, followed by Ivy rival Brown (6:26.105), Navy (6:40.707), Williams (6:55.039) and UC San Diego (7:00.839).

The third varsity eight competed in the final race of the day, took an early lead and never looked back in another semifinal win in open water (6:35.631) over second-place finisher Navy (6:42.745). Running third was St. Joseph's (6:46.785), followed by George Washington (6:54:516), Marietta (7:18.089) and Hobart (7:41.225).

Coach Allen was very proud of his team's accomplishment, "Our crews raced really well today against tough competition in challenging conditions. We put a lot of emphasis on putting together great team performances and it's tough to imagine the group having a better semi-finals day at the IRA. I know the team is excited to try to build off of today's racing in the Grand Finals tomorrow morning."

Saturday's schedule is set with the Men's Varsity 4+ grand finals at 8:30 a.m., third varsity at 9 a.m., second varsity at 9:50 a.m. and the championship race at 10:40 a.m.

For the latest in schedule updates got to http://irarowing.com/2021-championship.

1V
Samantha Sizelove (C), Paul Gralla (8), Caleb Edmundson (7), William Bender (6), Henry Lowe (5), Harrison Taylor (4), Joseph Hajjar (3), Mark Levinson (2), Liam Keane (1)

2V
Mikayla Hubner (C), Evan Dwinell (8), Will Kalikman (7), Dan Kramer (6), Clayton Kiyonaga (5), Gus Emmett (4), Luke Marshall (3), Will Sanford (2), Billy Lockhart (1)

3V
Reagan Readinger (C), Jack Taylor (8), Colin Glew (7), Theory Millar (6), Max Bessler (5), Robert Pare (4), Richie Santry (3), Alexander Lehr (2), Teddy Danziger (1)

V4 plus Cox
Sean Ward (B), Chris Stich (2), Jack Stone (3), Cooper Tuckerman (Str.), Addison Textor (Cox)