There was no calm on the water this past Saturday in Malden, Mass. when the women’s crew first eight, ranked tenth in New England, endured a grueling race against Tufts University, ranked sixth, the team’s second race of the day.

“Our race against Tufts was by far the most intense of the season,” said Elaine Lauriat ’09. “When we hit the midway point, Jinny [Jang ’08] told us we were dead even. Tufts had been ranked quite a bit above us, so we weren’t sure how we were going to do, but coming out exactly even with them halfway through was incredibly exciting.”

The second half of the race proved to be even more exciting. The deadlock between the two boats finally broke when Wesleyan pulled almost a boat length ahead of Tufts with a few hundred meters to go. In a crew race, the basic idea is that the rowers face away from the finish while the coxswain faces towards it and dictates the pace of the boat’s stroke. Heading into the final sprint, it was clear that the first eight would need a breakneck pace to stay ahead of the Jumbos.

With the race length dwindling to a few meters, Wesleyan’s half-length lead suddenly vanished. Tufts surged to within a few seats of victory down the stretch and it looked like anyone’s race. Coxswain JinnyJang ’08 put the heat on her rowers and they summed a little extra power to literally push their boat into first place.

“The Tufts win felt so fantastic,” said Catie Steidl ’11. “They took back a couple of seats in the sprint, but we had so much commitment in our boat that there was no way we were giving up the race. You can’t work that hard and then just to give in.”

Lauriat noted that the design of this particular course lends itself to excitement.

“The Tufts race course is really twisty for the first thousand meters,” she said. “So it’s hard to tell who’s ahead around the curves. The second half is a straightaway, though, so the last thousand meters are just a drag race.”

In what could be considered a photo finish, the team ended up beating Tufts by a mere 1.7 seconds—a suitable ending for such a dramatic race.

Earlier in the day, the team raced against a speedy Bates team ranked fifth in the region. The Bobcats burst out to a substantial early lead around the course’s curvy first section. Though trying to compete as best they could, the team also knew it needed to be able to race again that day. If their first race was out of hand early, they had agreed to slow their pace and conserve their energy.

“By the time we got through the halfway point in our race against Bates, it was pretty clear that they were faster than we were and that we weren’t going to be able to get past them,” Lauriat said. “Jinny made the call to take the power down and save our energy for the second race, which I think was crucial to our victory against Tufts.”

Because of the ’power down’ the boat finished 22 seconds behind Bates, belies the team’s decision to cede the race early on. It is never easy to call off the dogs, especially in the heat of competition, but Steidl realized that Jang’s decision to slacken the boat’s pace was the right one.

“Acknowledging that you can’t put everything you’ve got into beating a crew is a tough thing to do—we have a boat full of very competitive people—but we needed to be smart and just follow our race plan,” she said.

The first varsity eight was not the only Wesleyan women’s boat to compete on Saturday. The women’s four, or quad, turned in a dominant performance. The only time that Roger Williams was within shouting distance of the Cardinal Super Quad was before the race when the teams lined up at the starting marker. Putting innumerable boat lengths between themselves and their opponent, the quad finished 1:06 ahead of Roger Williams.

“After the first 500 meters of the race, I was confident in our substantial lead on the Roger William’s crew,” said Coxswain Sami Pop ’11. “I must admit that it is difficult to remain focused and excited when the competition is so far behind. This was the first time we raced the varsity four this season and we are all very excited about the result.”