A coaches report by the Zac Hernandez:
As most of you know, Loyola Varsity Sailing Team was in Grosse Pointe MI this weekend for the Mallory Qualifiers. One of the 2 chances that LA has to qualify for a National regatta this season. Loyola Sailing has not qualified for Mallory nationals in 8 years. The top 2 teams in the qualifier get a berth to Nationals.
Saturday started off with south winds around 16 and puffs reaching up to 23mph. The plan was to start Alex Post in A Division with Ciara McHugh, but the wind was not agreeing with this choice. So a last minute decision was made to have Kevin Kennedy crew for Alex until the wind dies down. A few minutes after the first A Division start; I’m looking through my Binoculars at the LA boat and noticed that we are in second place close to the port layline. Still looking at them I noticed that there is no one in the LA boat, and it is on its side. I look back to the left and Kevin is holding on to the main sheet being dragged by the boat underwater, and Alex is swimming his little heart out to try to get to the boat. Kevin pulls himself up to the boat and uprights it just as Alex gets there. Seconds latter they are back on their way to a 8th place finish (which was later changed to a 4 because of the break down). Lets just say that I told them that we are not on the LA swim team, one of the main objectives is to stay in the boat. It turns out that the hiking strap blew out, that’s why they ended up in the drink.
The rest of the morning was not quite as interesting, Tommy Holmberg was skippering B Division with John Kinzel as his crew. Tommy when out had got a 2nd place and a 4th place, but currently we need some big plays to get us back into the points. Oh yah, Tommy and John stayed in their boat. We are sitting in 3rd place after lunch with the wind now at 18mph with the gusts up to 28mph.
Starting the second set, Alex and Kevin headed out in the big breeze and returned to the dock with a 1st and 2nd place finish. The seas start to roll in LA favor. Tommy and John head out and get a 1st and 5th. We are still in 3rd place, but closing on 2nd. A storm comes rolling through, so racing is postponed for a about an hour.
After the cell blew through, the winds calmed down to around 10 knots. Ciara McHugh is now going to sail with Alex in the A Division and Juliann Sargis is going to crew for Tommy in the B Division.
Alex and Ciara rig the boats back up and sail out for the start of race A5. They have a great start and hit the first shift and win the race by 20 boat lengths. The next race Alex and Ciara have another great start and win the race again. Tommy now seeing that Alex has brought the game to the table, has to go out and not get shown up by Alex. Tommy and Sargis have 2 very smart and conservative races to combine for 6 points. Loyola Sailing has just moved into 1st place. A division ended up racing 2 extra races, before we had to call it a day and head in for dinner.
Day 2 started off with Loyola with 32 points, and the next 2 teams with 38 points.
There is a real think fog Sunday when we get to the Yacht Club. We would stay in postponement for 4 hours until the fog lifted and it was time to go out and get a few last races in. Since the A Division had 2 more races than the B, the B Division would start off racing for the Loyola Ramblers. The only team that Loyola had to keep and eye on was Lake Forest LF. Tommy and Sarg sailed 2 perfect races and put 5 points on the lead from LF. Having a nice 11-point lead on LF, the Race Committee decides to do one more A race and one more B race before the time limit ended for the day.
Winds are at a very light 5 mph, and seas are flat as Alex and Ciara head out for their only race of the day. LA got fouled up and the starting line and ended up fighting back for a 9th place finish, the bad news was that LF got a 1st place that race. Now our point lead on LF has dropped to only 3 points with one race left. Tommy and Sarg get into their boat, knowing that the game plan is tight cover LF the entire race. Tommy and Sarg have a good start, while LF had a great start. After a few tactical moves, Tommy finds himself right next to the LF boat. Meanwhile I have displaced my self from the group so I could calm down and not let my nerves get the best of me. Watching from a distance, Tommy pinched the LF boat off and there after tacked on them the rest of the race. Tommy and Sarg never let the LF boat get out from behind them and lead the Loyola Ramblers to a Team Overall 2nd Place finish.
Congrats to the Sailors, and all of the hard work that they have displayed.
We will be traveling to St. Petersburg FL in 2 weeks to compete at Mallory Nationals.
Mallory Nationals Qualifying Results
2nd Place Team Overall. 3rd in A Division Alex Post, Kevin Kennedy, Ciara McHugh, and Tayler Crimaldi.
3rd place in B Division Tommy Holmberg, John Kinzel, Juliann Sargis and Grace Williams.
Thanks to Mr. Hudson of New Trier for these great SG coverages!
http://www.sailgroove.org/videos/coverage/view/234958-missa-mallory-qualifier
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