A coach's report by the Zac Hernandez:
Loyola Varsity Sailing Team was in Saint Petersburg this past weekend for the Mallory Nationals. It’s the 1st time in 8 years that Loyola Sailing has qualified for Mallory Nationals. Going into the weekend we knew that there was going to be some very stiff competition.
Since Tommy Holmberg show great character and the ability to close a regatta in the Mallory Qualifier, I awarded him the Starting A Division Skipper. The A Division stared in FJs instead of 420’s, and the B Division with Alex Post at the Helm was sailing in 420’s. It is a great way to run a regatta if you have 40 boats, that way the A and B Division are out on the water all day. We started racing Saturday Morning right around 9:45. Tommy sailing with Melinda Lee and Alex sailing with Ciara McHugh both had a good start and raced a real smart and safe race coming back with a 9 in A and a 13 in B. Loyola is looking pretty good so far. The second A race Tommy had the start looking well until he was rolled and squeezed out the back of the pack, directly in the middle of the line with no where to go. He tried of couple of different thing to get back up to the pack, but was never successful. Alex started the 2nd B start in a great spot and continued to hold his position after the windward mark. Alex finished with a strong 5th place finish. Loyola is currently in 12 place overall.
Starting the 2 set Tommy and Alex headed out and got a 17th in A and a 14th in B. Race 4 A Tommy had a great start and rounded the windward mark in 6th place. Trying to fight off the rest of the fleet down wind, Tommy finished with a solid 7th. Very good race Tommy. Alex came back with a 15th place in race 4 B.
At the end of set 2 the wind had started picking up form 8 to around 13 or so. At the rotation dock, John Kinzel went in to crew for Tommy and Chris Lynch went in with Alex. Alex went out and in race 5B with a perfect start and a rounded the leeward mark in 5th place, took a quick hitch out to the left and came flying back down the middle of the course and placed 3rd. The A sailors where given a break to come in and eat lunch while the B’s stayed out for another race. Tommy and I discussed how difficult the starts are in the A Division, and decided to have Tommy try to win the boat end. Alex still sailing with Lynch, had great start and rounded the windward in 7th place and continued gaining ground down wind. Not realizing that the RC had changed the course from a Leeward mark with a on offset, to a gate leeward mark, Alex got in side mark room an all 6 boats ahead of him, and cruised to a 1st place. A’s now done with their lunch god back out on to the water, but the wind has died a bit and john is out and Melinda Lee is back in with Tommy. The B’s come in for their lunch break. Tommy went out and pushed the start at the boat and won the boat. The bad new is that the wind had died and only filled in at the pin and Tommy was stuck in no wind land. Tommy was never able to recover from that. Lets just say that our game plan of winning the boat backfired on us pretty bad.
Starting set 4 Tommy is now sailing with Grace Williams and Ciara is back in with Alex. Loyola is currently sitting in 13th place overall in the standings. I continued crew switching ever set from now on due to the high heat and very long day out on the water. Tommy finished the set off with a 10 and a 17. Tommy had to fight back from 15th to get his 10 place, very smart sailing. Alex got a 13 and a 14.
Set 5 the last set in the FJs for the A and last set in the 420’s for the B’s. Tayler Crimaldi is now sailing with Tommy and Ciara is still in with Alex. At this point Alex and Tommy have been out on the water sailing for over 6 hours. Stu and myself where force-feeding Tommy and Alex water and power bars every time we saw them between races. The heat was really starting to affect Alex. Tommy was holding strong.
Tommy had his best set of the regatta with a 11 and a 14. Tommy is really starting to sail like I know he could. Alex returned with a 16 and 12 in his final races in a 420.
The wind started to pick back up a bit again and Kinzel is in with Tommy. And Lynch is back in with Alex. As some in the sailing world would say the Meat Toboggans are in again, meaning the big crews. Lets face it our female crew peaks at 115. Tommy would go out and get a solid 15th place and Alex would not fair so well with his worse race of the regatta, a 20th. RC decides that that was enough for the day and I had the crew skipper the boats in because Tommy and Alex had now been out on the water for almost 10 hours. That’s no joke. Alex looked a lot like he had become death. When we got back over to the docks we had Tommy and Alex got directly back to the Hotel rooms to relax in the air and drink some water, not to fall asleep. I had to re-hydrate them before bedtime. Loyola is currently hanging onto 15th place.
Day 2 starting of with light winds Tommy sailing with Melinda in 420s and Alex sailing in FJs with Ciara. Stu is helping Tommy get straight and splash his boat, while I’m over with Alex. As we are getting ready to splash Alex and Ciara’s boat, the team next to us was splashing their boat. Not paying attention one of the other guys bumped into Alex and Alex fell back onto Ciara as she was turning. Lets just say that Ciara was in a great amount of pain. And I was non-to happy with the other kids that bumped into Alex. I got Ciara off the dock and over to a chair where we got her some ice and Stu came right over to take a look. Stu, who is only one class away from being a certified paramedic, said that she was defiantly not able to sail this morning. As Stu is tacking a look at Ciara I had to grab lynch and tell him that he has 30 second to get dressed and back over he, bad news is that Kinzel had starting walking over to the pier. Lynch just caught him at the end of the parking lot. Tommy’s boat not knowing what has happen, because they had already left the dock. Our best crew was down and not happy. Day 2 was not looking so good for LA. Tommy went out and had a tough race, and came back in for rotations. Alex’s day despite the early crew loss would not slow him down.
Set 7. I had to make a very tough call and remove the skipper that just about single handily put us in a position to qualify for nationals. Tommy was out and John Kinzel would get his first driving action at Nationals. Said John Kinzel, "This is the best day of my life!!" Kinzel is sailing with Melinda. After experiencing how difficult the starts where when in with Tommy, we had decided to have John push the start. John defiantly push the start and was OCS both races, which gave him a 18 and 18 place finishes. Alex and lynch go out and nail a 9th place finish then was OSC and got a 19th.
Set 8. Kinzel still Skippering A, now with Grace Williams, and Alex sailing with Tayler Crimaldi. Kinzel went out and pushed the starts again and was OCS on the 1st race and late to the 2nd race because him and I were talking at the dock. My bad. Alex continued a strong day and knocked out a 8 and 9th place finish. Set 9. Tommy is in and I am very excited about seeing him back in a boat. Tommy back in driving A Division with Grace and Alex staying with Tay. Tommy had a fighting chance at the start but ended up getting shot out the back. But he kept his attitude in check and rocked the next start and was top 5 going up the next beat. Again bad luck strikes us and the wind shuts off on the left side and Tommy sits and watches 10 boats pass him with nothing to do. Alex and Tay finish the regatta off with a great 4 – 9 punch.
Congrats to the Sailors, and all of the hard work and determination.
Just qualifying for Mallory Nationals was a tremendous feet in itself.
Zac’s Complete Crew Sheet for Mallory Nationals.
Lets just say that this should be just as confusing for you as it was to me at the time. You can only switch personal every 2 races, unless this is a postponement, and you can only switch crew from one Division to the other Division once. Once you drive in one Division you are stuck in that Division. You have to very carefully try to figure out if the wind in going to pick up or not (while keeping in mind the weather for the next day), because if you switch a sailors Division too early, you’re in trouble.
17th Place Team Overall – 476 Points
18th in A Division – 284 Points - Tommy Holmberg, John Kinzel, Melinda Lee, Grace Williams and Tayler Crimaldi
12th place in B Division - 192 Points - Alex Post, Ciara McHugh, Chris Lynch and Tayler Crimaldi
A Division
Skippering
Tommy Holmberg: Race 1-12, and 17-18
John Kinzel: Race 13-16
Crew
Melinda Lee: Race 1-4, 6, and 12-14
John Kinzel: Race 5, 11
Grace Williams: Race 7-8, and 15-18
Tayler Crimaldi: Race 9-10
B Division
Skippering
Alex Post: Race 1-18
Crew
Ciara McHugh: Race 1-4, and 7-10 (injured)
Chris Lynch: Race 5-6, and 11-14
Tayler Crimaldi: Race 15-18
2009 Mallory National Results
A B Total
1. Newport Harbor 99 106 205
2. Cathedral Catholic 133 142 275
3. Corona del Mar 140 147 287
4. Sarasota 174 119 293
5. Plant 138 167 305
6. Norfolk Collegiate 146 161 307
7. St. George's 153 166 319
8. Point Loma 172 160 332
9. Christchurch School 146 200 346
10. Portsmouth Abbey 181 175 356
11. Severn 158 205 363
12. Antilles School 188 192 380
13. New Trier 263 121 384
14. Tabor Academy 209 181 390
15. Francis Parker 180 237 417
16. Martin County 142 296 438
17. Loyola Academy 284 192 476
18. Williams School 257 238 495
19. Orcas Island 292 312 604
20. Brother Martin 327 278 605
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