Nov. 5, 2008
LORTON, VA - The Johns Hopkins men's crew team logged a successful weekend at the Head of the Occoquan regatta last Saturday on an unseasonably warm day. With a previous race cancelled due to inclement weather, this regatta was the first race experience for many of the freshman rowers.
The Men's Varsity Eight (sophomores Daniel Bagdorf, William Cooper and Andrew Faulkner, junior Joshua Crist, sophomore George Reynolds, junior Pete Ranieri, senior Taylor Reese and freshman Julian Kabawat) took fourth place. The crew, coxed by junior Stephen Hou, trailed behind George Mason, who took first place on their home course, Penn State and Loyola.
The Men's Freshman Eight fared remarkably well, coming in third behind Loyola and George Mason. The crew, consisting of Saumya Gurbani, Kabawat, Nick Ford, Kyle Rohrbach, Cliffton Jenkins-Houk, John Halvorsen, Tyler Smith, Kevin Boyle and Frank Yao, trailed George Mason by only two seconds, despite this being the first race for four of the eight rowers. Both crews posted solid results against familiar regional competitors, giving the coaches and athletes an idea of how much work will need to be done this winter in order to come out ahead of these opponents during the spring season.
Sophomore
Marc Webb, rowing in the Championship Single event, took third place. In the Varsity 4+ event, two even crews consisting of rowers from the second varsity finished fourteen seconds apart, in 16th and 21st out of 37 boats. The "A" boat, coxed by sophomore
Alisha Tuteja, was rowed by Ranieri, sophomore
William Bagdorf, junior
Adam Ammar and sophomore
Max Thorsbakken. The "B" Boat, coxed by junior
Raheel Zubair, consisted of senior
Cameron Ward, Cooper, sophomores
Steve Cardinali and
Eric Chen.
The Freshman 4+ (Gurbani, Ford, Sam Luo, Jenkins-Houk, Bob Huang) performed admirably, coming in 11th out of 18, with this being the first race for four of the five athletes in the boat, as well as the first race for this new lineup.
