The last major championship of the collegiate season, the IRA National Title offered events to lightweight men and women as well as two divisions of heavyweight men’s teams. This allows some of the fastest crews in the world to face off against one and other on the national stage on Mercer Lake in Princeton, New Jersey.
The racing began on Friday morning with the heats where California, Yale, Princeton and Washington all had fairly comfortable wins to clinch victory in their respective heats, but it was the second automatic qualification spot where the drama lay. Brown upset Dartmouth to take it in heat one and Northeastern won a close race against the more favoured Stanford. The other automatic spots went to Harvard and Syracuse without too much drama.
Those who missed out on a top two finish had to return to the racecourse on Friday afternoon for repechages as the mercury climbed to 34°C. Dartmouth and Penn were the class of their fields while Stanford was made to work far harder than they will have wanted to as Boston University pushed them very close. The story of the afternoon was in the third repechage where Cornell overcame finishing fourth in their heat to beat Wisconsin for a place in the AB Semi Final. Eventually the heat rose so much that racing had to be cancelled for the day and the heavyweight third eights and both men’s fours had their racing cancelled and progression was determined on the morning’s results.
For the Saturday semi-finals, the weather had cooled down, but the racing was hotter than ever. In the first semi-final California and Washington finished comfortably ahead of the rest but Northeastern recovered from being a length down at the halfway point to row through the Harvard Crimson for the final spot in the Grand Final. In the other semi-final, the progression of Princeton, Yale and Syracuse was not unexpected as the Orange absorbed a late push by Brown. The order at the front end, however, raised some surprises. It was a close start to the race, but the Princeton Tigers were able to take the victory and the favoured lane in the final, breaking Yale’s unbeaten record along with it.
In the Grand Final on Sunday, it was all California as the Golden Bears took an early lead, which they stretched out to a length by the halfway point, but the races going on behind them drew them back towards the field. The Washington Huskies were engaged in a battle with the Princeton Tigers for the remaining podium spots with the men from Seattle taking the silver-medal position, matching the performance of their women’s team last weekend. It was not the fairy-tale ending in New Haven as Steve Gladstone’s final year at Yale, finishing off the podium as they beat Syracuse to place fourth, with Northeastern rounding out the field well behind.
In the lower events it was all going California’s way as they swept the men’s heavyweight events winning all three eights and the four. This commanding performance led to a perfect 288 points as they won the Ten Eyck Memorial Plaque for the best team performance.
In the Division Three events, Williams continued their dominance. The Ephs successfully defended their title in the first eight by a margin of 5.5 seconds while adding a victory in the new second eight event their winning margin was 8 seconds.
For the lightweights, it was all coming up Princeton. The women’s team won the double, the four and the eight by an average margin of 3.9 seconds. On the men’s side of the boat house it was a similar story as they won the first and second eight meaning that the only title that would travel further than the five miles to Shea Rowing Center was the lightweight four which was won by top four athletes from Georgetown.
Another year, and another IRAs is done. California have backed up their win last year to make it a double in what could be the beginning’s of a new dynasty with the 1V still being a young group and the squad depth impressive, demonstrated by their wins across the four main events. We may see some of these crews in action again at Henley Royal Regatta in the UK, but for the IRA’s, see you next year.
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