The crew team took to the water at the 60th annual Head of the Charles Regatta in Boston this past weekend, competing in the men’s and women’s varsity four at the world’s largest three-day rowing competition. The women’s boat finished fifth out of 41 teams, while the men finished 25th out of 40.
The 4,800-meter race is the longest regatta that the team competes in across both its fall and spring seasons, according to senior coxswain Annabelle Witkowski.
“The strategy is definitely going into this race with a strong mental game,” Witkowski said. “It’s more of a marathon than a sprint, setting ourselves up to know where to push and where to lengthen out and pace ourselves.”
Finishing with a time of 19:31.066, the women’s boat consisting of Witkowski, senior Elle Lansing, senior Kelsey Donatelli, junior Ally Krohg and sophomore Bridget Duffy was 49 seconds shy of first-place Carleton College. The squad kicked off the race in second, allowing Witkowski to “determine her course.”
“We wanted to get out in front,” Witkowski said. “We started off at a pretty high sprint, around 35 strokes per minute, all the way through the first bridge to set our pace before lengthening out into our base rate.”
After hitting the 4,000-meter mark, Witkowski said the last bend of the race was about “breathing and pacing ourselves.”
“We wanted to really empty it all to the finish line to shave as much time as we could,” she said. “Through the last 200 meters, all four of the girls really dug deep and dropped some time off our splits.”
The men’s boat of senior Owen Baute, senior Christo Maheras, senior Isaac Odell, junior Ryan Delmore and senior coxswain Bella Bursor clocked in at a time of 17:22.841, about a minute and 19 seconds behind the first-place finishers Jacksonville University.
The most difficult portion of the regatta came at the Eliot Bridge, where the team had to “lay on the pressure,” according to Maheras.
“If you miss a stroke, the consequences of that turn could be that you crash into the bridge,” Maheras said. “My mindset was to not necessarily save myself, but to try to approach that turn with the most focus I have.”
Maheras also credited Bursor with keeping the team in check throughout the race.
“Obviously, her job is to steer, but it’s also going to keep us in rhythm and trying to keep us focused and motivated the whole race,” he said.
A group of women’s crew alumni also competed in the alumni eights event, finishing 42nd out of 52 with a final pace of 19:05.780.
The crew team will return to action on Saturday and Sunday at the Head of the Schuylkill Regatta in Philadelphia.
“The Charles was almost our test run for the following races,” Witkowski said. “Knowing that we were able to put up a fight at the Charles, I’m really looking forward to laying down some speed at the Schuylkill.”