George Washington University Athletics
Sailing Takes 12th Place at Women's Nationals
5/26/2018 12:00:00 AM | Sailing
NORFOLK, Va. â€" The GW sailing team nearly recorded its second top-10 finish at women's nationals in program history but settled for 12th place as the event wrapped up on Friday in Norfolk, Virginia.
After a slow start on Thursday, the Colonials moved all the way up to 10th place on Friday in a tightly-packed field. They were edged out of the top 10 by the narrowest of margins, as Dartmouth had a score of 352, followed by Boston University (354) and GW (356). Boston College won the national championship with a score of 246.
"I'm really proud of the team," said head coach Billy Martin. "They never stopped fighting and made a great effort to make up a lot of points throughout the event after a slow start. It was really tight racing and the margin for error was so small."
GW made its charge with six top-nine finishes in races 14A-17B to move slightly ahead of Dartmouth and Boston, before consecutive 14th place finishes in the final two races dropped the Colonials to 12th. In A Division, Miranda Bakos and Belle Strachan were 11th while Riley Legault and Alexandra Fayer led GW to an eighth-place result in B Division.
Bakos and Strachan, along with classmate Kia Olsson, close their careers racing in women's nationals with finishes of 13th, 10th, 13th and 12th, respectively.
"This season as a whole was one of the best we've had as a program," said Martin. "Even though we wanted a top-10 finish, we were right there until the end and gave ourselves a chance against the best teams in the country. Our seniors have provided such great leadership so I want to thank them for everything they've done. We're all ready and looking forward to moving on to Team Racing over the next three days."
Team Race nationals run Saturday through Monday and are followed by coed nationals from Tuesday-Friday.
Players Mentioned
