Many of Dartmouth's athletic programs are traditionally highly successful. Of the athletes in the Winter Olympics who hail from Ivy League institutions, half attended Dartmouth. Some of these athletes, especially those who participate in endurance sports like distance running or swimming, remove themselves from the boozy Hanover partying culture. They drop an aspect of their social lives in order to focus more completely on their athletic pursuits. While "going dry," as sports-related prohibitions are often referred to, might help people shave seconds off of their times, quitting drinking for a time is often met with disappointment from non-athlete friends.
A number of winter sports programs are "dry" for the winter. To be honest, many are closer to "damp" or "moist," but neither one of these terms would be recognizable outside of the minds of a very few sportswriters for college newspapers.
While referring to a Dartmouth team as moist might earn you a solid shot of pepper spray and an exceptionally awkward meeting with the Committee on Standards, you might get even stranger response in other college towns across the country. Apparently students at other schools with Division I athletics totally abstain from alcohol for the entirety of their competitive seasons.
The runners at the University of Richmond are not particularly notable for their level of success. While they had the 2004 individual Atlantic 10 champ on the roster, the men's cross country team finished fifth in the Atlantic 10 conference this past fall. So, the Spiders are respectable, not a dynasty, but certainly not doormats either.
They are notable, however, for the severity with which they punish violations of team rules regarding alcohol. Several members of the team were kicked off after pictures of them imbibing adult beverages surfaced on an online running forum, and the team rules reflect the laws of the Commonwealth. Namely, if you can't buy beer, you shouldn't be drinking it either.
"If you're caught breaking the rules, you're pretty much off the team," sophomore Spiders' cross country runner Mike Stubbs said.
Other sports programs pursue similar avenues and arrive at somewhat different results. Princeton distance runners have a little bit more leeway than the Richmond crew. Of late, the Tigers have also enjoyed a bit more success than the Spiders as well.
"There's no official ban, but people on our team don't drink a whole lot...people pretty much keep it in check," Princeton sophomore David Nightingale said.
Dartmouth's runners are a traditional power in the Ivy League, having brought home a pile of Heptagonals hardware over the years. However, the fleet-of-foot Hanover residents are also known to have a good time. Drinking is permitted on the nights after indoor meets, when the next competition is at the earliest a week away. The nights after meets are known to be a "good time" according to some members of the team. The results, including six individual winners for the men's team at Saturday's Dartmouth Indoor Classic, make it tough to argue with giving the guys a night off once a week.
The men's swim team has a far more strict alcohol policy, however. As Shane Foster '07 explains, "We can drink up until about two months away from our big meet. That's the last meet of the season. We go dry and anyone who violates this policy can get into a lot of trouble."
"We also take a training trip in December and there is absolutely no alcohol on that trip," he continued. "If you are caught drinking while on that trip you are kicked off the team."
Foster noted that the members of the team follow these rules very closely.
So while drinking regulations vary among teams and colleges, it doesn't always seem as though having a few beers dooms you to spend the rest of your playing days at left bench lamenting the jump in your BAC that derailed your career. However, those who plan to remove the vomit from their hair just in time to suit up for the first pitch might want to remember that while having to pick which of the three balls you're seeing to take deep makes for a good story -- as Ty Cobb once rather infamously boasted -- you might want to take it easy.
