Team racing in Easter Term is much quieter due to exams. We still had three big events, the Varsity Match held in Cowes, Cuppers (inter-college sailing held at Grafham Water) and the Wilson Trophy at West Kirby.
Wilson Trophy
Team Red attended the Wilson Trophy this year. After 3 days of racing with some epic wins as well as big defeats to some of the American teams, Cambridge placed 21st overall. This made them 4th university team and best 2nd team at the event an amazing testament to their ability.
Cuppers
During May Week we hosted Cuppers at Grafham. This was highly successful, with a great breeze and even some sun making for high quality racing and spectating. As always, the highlight was being able to share the BBQ and Pimms with such a wide range of teams. Some college team members had never team raced (or even sailed…) before. Other college teams such as Caius had two teams made up of CUCrC sailors. Last night’s May Balls meant a non-negligible number of sailors on some of the lower seeded teams failed to make the coach for 10am . However we still managed a full schedule of racing. Robinson College (Juliette Kennedy, Gordon Sivarajan, Olly Perkins, Matty Cohen) won the Gold league and the Yule Oldham Trophy. Combined Murray Edwards and Newnham (Lisanne Blok Ellen Morley, Charlotte Watson and Jenny Jiang) won the Royal Harwich YC Swordfish Tankard for second place.
Varsity Match
The Varsity match was held at Island Sailing Club in Cowes and we raced in Sonars. The first day was match racing. Cambridge 1st team, helmed by Juliette Kennedy ended up winning, however Cambridge 2nd team unfortunately lost. On the second day the team racing started. This ended up being a bit of a disaster for both the ladies and open teams, both losing 3 races in a row. This meant Oxford only had to win one more race in each competition to take the trophy home.
The second day became more exciting for Cambridge, with the open team winning their first two races by a considerable margin, swiftly followed by a convincing win from the ladies teams. The next race became the final race for the ladies, who despite being ahead for most the race, ended up losing their winning combination at the last minute. The next race in the open team again resulted in a Cambridge win, leaving it all down to the final race, which we were winning with a secure 123 combination. Devastatingly, as is perhaps to be expected with mile long runs, Oxford began to gain throughout the downwind. Oxford eventually caught up and gained a winning combination on the final beat, leading them to cross the finish line ahead.
Despite the sadness of losing both the open and ladies team races, the event ended on a high, concluding with a black tie dinner with Oxford at the Island Sailing Club.
