The New England Dingy Championship, hosted by Brown University on May 6-7, featured 18 of New England's best collegiate sailing teams fighting for only four qualifying spots.
Collegiate sailing tests the brainpower and muscles of 18 two-person teams, each striving to outmaneuver opponents and cross the finish line first in a series of 20 minute-long races.
Nearing the end of competition, Brown and Boston College had run away with the first two qualifying spots, but Dartmouth, Harvard, Yale and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology were in a battle for the third and fourth spots. With just two races to go, the Big Green found itself in third place with Yale and MIT two points back, and Harvard only four points behind.
The pressure meant nothing to Erik Storck '07 and Killarney Loufek '07, who responded with a sixth and first place finish, respectively, to close out their day.
Now the burden fell upon Ben Sampson '08 and Christina Duncan '06, who finished the regatta for Dartmouth in 'B' Division -- regattas use a two-division format, with finishing positions for each team's 'A' Division and 'B' Division combined to determine the overall winner of a regatta.
Sampson and Duncan braved mounting winds to finish sixth and 13th, respectively, holding off MIT and Ivy foes Harvard and Yale to grab the third qualifying spot.
In the end, Brown won the event (102 points), with Boston College (109 points) second. MIT and Yale faltered under the pressure leaving Dartmouth in third with 135 points, two points ahead of Harvard (137 points), and four points ahead of Yale (139 points), while MIT dropped to eighth.
Storck and Loufek continued their year-long dominance in 'A' division, finishing second, only three points behind Boston College. In 'B' division the team of Todd Whitehead '06 and Laura Sheinkopf '07 on Saturday and Sampson and Duncan on Sunday combined for a 10th place finish.
Although it didn't become windy enough for them to compete, Andrew Geffken '08 and Jimmy Attridge '07 also made the trip down to Brown, providing emotional support and comic relief for the Big Green sailors.
Ideally every team would sail every boat during the course of an event. With 18 teams a full rotation through all the boats would require 18 races in both divisions, but Providence's fickle winds only allowed for 10. With so few races, the importance of each race was magnified and the results were even closer than usual.
After racing, Storck and Loufek were named to the 2006 All-New England Team and Loufek received the Babineau Trophy as the best crew in New England.
"I was really honored and surprised to receive the award." Loufek said. "It means a lot to be so respected by my peers and coaches."
Both Storck, a returning All-American, and Loufek are All-American hopefuls.
The Big Green women's sailors will head to Charleston, S.C. for women's nationals on May 23 with the coed team headed south for coed nationals on the 30th.
Both teams hope that hard work in the next few weeks will allow them to improve upon their respective sixth and third place finishes last year.
"For one thing, we have history on our side," Storck said. "The last time nationals were in Charleston, Dartmouth won both the women's and coed championships."
Storck and Loufek hope to continue their personal success in Charleston as well, having won the U.S. Youth National Championships there in 2004.
