The Big Green women's first boat advanced to the Grand Final by placing second in the qualifying round behind Princeton, but was unable to hit its stride in the Grand Final, coming in fifth place in the heat.
"Ultimately we were hoping to be in third or fourth place," said head women's coach Wendy Levash.
The loss was especially difficult for the senior women who will not be rowing again for Dartmouth. The team will probably not be invited to NCAA's.
"I think we did the best we could, it is devastating that our performance did not quite match up," said senior captain Anne Kennedy '07.
However, it was certainly a highlight of the afternoon for the women's program to see both varsity women's boats qualify for the Grand Final heat.
The Dartmouth first varsity heavyweight boat placed fourth in the third final heat, defeating Rutgers University and coming in a little over two seconds behind Columbia University. Columbia took third in the race with a time of 5:44.2. Dartmouth finished with a time of 5:46.3 and Rutgers came in fifth at 5:48.6. Earlier in the season, on April 21, Rutgers toasted Dartmouth's varsity eight on the Charles River in Boston by almost eight seconds.
"You always want to win, the important thing is that we put together a pretty solid piece," head coach Topher Bordeau said.
It was difficult for the heavyweight men to score so low in the Sprints.
"You can never be satisfied with our final run, it's viewed as a summation of the lack of success we had this year," captain Jeremy Feldman '07 said after the race. "We really don't want to be in the third-level final.
The second Dartmouth varsity heavyweight boat finished in last place in the first heat of the day and in last place overall, ten seconds behind the nearest boat in its final race.
This Sunday, May 20, the heavyweights will be at Syracuse and then will be competing in the International Rowing Association Championship Regatta during the weekend of May 31.
