With wind speeds of up to 20 miles an hour, the men's lightweight crew team's varsity eight suffered a loss to rival Harvard University.
With a time of 5:51.4, the Big Green beat Massachusetts Institute of Technology by almost 30 seconds. Dartmouth, however, fell short of a win against the Crimson, which crossed the finish line approximately two seconds earlier at 5:49.5.
"We knew the Harvard race was going to be pretty big because this year we're right up there with them in terms of our speed," captain Phil Henson '11 said. "Unfortunately, we didn't get it in the end."
Although the race was only the team's second competition of the spring season, Henson said the members of the varsity eight are "pretty familiar which each other," as they returned six rowers from last year's varsity eight.
Henson said he was proud that the team was able to keep the race extremely close and even pull ahead of Harvard at various points.
"Harvard's a great team, and they're always really fast," he said. "Being able to stick with them all the way down the course is a good test of our speed."
For the heavyweight crew team, a disappointing finish by the varsity eight against Boston University this past weekend was offset by an outstanding victory by the freshmen boat against Boston University's talented rookie squad.
Captain Alex Pujol '11 said that the team went into the race confident but expecting a challenge.
Ultimately, Boston University bested the Big Green by 10 seconds with a time of 6:21.1. Rutgers University also competed in the race, coming nine seconds behind Dartmouth with a time of 6:40.9.
Regarding the varsity eight performance, Pujol said he would have "liked to be a little closer to Boston University" and that the conditions proved to be a too much of a challenge for the team.
"It was a really windy day, so the water was choppy," he said. "If we could handle the conditions better we could be more successful in our next races."
Dartmouth proved its impressive depth against both teams with the freshman and third varsity boats placing in first.
Pujol said the solid performance by the freshmen and third varsity boat "was a testament to the depth of the program."
The freshmen have been improving steadily throughout the course of the year, Pujol said.
"We have high hopes for them," he said. "They could be a top-tier freshman crew."
The Big Green's next few races against Brown University, the Universiy of Wisconsin and MIT will offer Dartmouth rowers the home-course advantage.
"[Brown] is definitely the race to watch," he said. "We haven't beat Brown in a while, so I think this is our best chance to beat them in the past four years."
The women had mixed results in their two regattas this past weekend, first against Harvard-Radcliffe, Syracuse University and the University of Minnesota on Saturday, then against Northeastern University, Ohio State University and Harvard-Radcliffe on Sunday.
During Saturday's race, the women's varsity eight boat was able to best all three teams and the less-than-ideal conditions, taking first, but Harvard-Radcliffe and Ohio State pulled ahead of the Big Green on Sunday after a down-to-the-wire race in which Ohio State crossed the finish line just .7 seconds ahead of Dartmouth.
Captain Emily Dreissigacker '11 said this past weekend was a huge improvement over the previous weekend's meet against Yale University and Boston University. The two regattas represented big races for the women's team, as Harvard-Radcliffe has always been a longtime rival.
"It's back and forth between us and them these past few years with winning," she said. "So that's a pretty important one for us."
Next week, the team will compete against League rivals Princeton University and the University of Pennsylvania at home.
"I think that if we continue to improve at the rate we have been improving in the past week, I think that we will do really well," Dreissigacker said.
This weekend the men's lightweight team will next face Yale and Columbia University, the former of which the Big Green tied with last year in a very high-intensity race.
"It was impossible to determine who was ahead in the end [last year]," Henson said. "So I guess we have to settle the score there."
