Unfazed by a five-month hiatus from competition, the women's golf team traveled to Bermuda over Spring Break to train and returned with a pair of third place finishes in tournament play.
Last October, the women received a number of outstanding individual performances en route to ending their fall season with a strong eighth place finish in the ECAC Championships.
Bermuda's warm temperatures and cloudless skies gave the linksters the opportunity to pick up their games almost where they left off in the fall, and the women took full advantage of the situation.
Throughout the trip they played and practiced on three different courses, one of which, Mid-Ocean, is ranked among the top 100 courses in the world.
"It was a fun course to play," Lauren Epstein '00 said. "It wasn't so hard that it was unplayable, but there was a lot of trouble around the greens with water and sand."
The Big Green began competing in the middle of the week when they squared off against Rutgers, Hartford, and Mount Holyoke in a best-ball competition on Tuesday.
Epstein and Samantha Sommers '99 were the Big Green's most successful twosome as they combined for a score of 80 on the Port Royal Golf Course.
Rutgers won the event, notching a low score of 243 while Hartford took runner-up honors with a 248. Dartmouth was four shots behind in third place, and Mount Holyoke finished fourth, scoring 278.
"The team played very well in the tournament, especially on the first day," Sommers remarked. "It gave [us] the confidence we needed for the upcoming season."
During the following two days the four schools faced off again, this time in a 36-hole tournament on the same course.
Rutgers, a perennial power in the Northeast, again topped its competition, firing a score of 671. Hartford trailed the winners by seven strokes, Dartmouth was third with 702, and Mount Holyoke brought up the rear.
Sommers placed fifth for the Big Green, shooting 85-86--171, and Epstein was sixth with 81-91--172.
"I should have shot about an 83 in the second round," Epstein said.
She was nine over par on two of the last three holes after falling victim to some bunkers, but then stepped back into form and got a par on the final hole.
"It was tough because it got hilly at times and the holes that were near the water got windy and it was hard to control the ball," Epstein said.
Sommers also noted that the greens were very had during the tournament, forcing the women to make some adjustments in their games.
"You could hit a great shot and then proceed to watch the ball bounce off the green into a sand trap or the rough," Sommers said.
With snow still covering the ground in Hanover, the team can look forward to days of practice in Leverone Fieldhouse where the plastic ceiling is a dirty white, a far cry from the bright blue skies in Bermuda.
Still, the women are optimistic that they can be very competitive in the northeast this spring, and are especially looking forward to the first ever Ivy League Championship for women's golf later in the season.
"I know that the team is going to have a great spring and hopefully we can post some low scores," Sommers said.
The women will return to action on April 5 at the Boston College Invitational.
