Wayward boat sinks Penn heavyweight rowing's chances

Defeat literally came out of nowhere for the Penn men’s heavyweight rowing team Saturday at the Childs Cup in Overpeck, N.J.

A wayward boat warming up for a high school regatta veered into the middle of Penn’s lane roughly 800 meters into the 2000m race, taking the No. 13 Quakers out of contention and helping ensure the fourth victory in a row for No. 4 Princeton with a time of 5:45.0.

No. 15 Columbia placed second in 5:47.5 and Penn finished third in 5:56.2, keeping up with the Lions until the unwelcome boat, which had been preparing for the North Jersey Rowing Regatta, ran into the Quakers’ path.

Launch boats holding coaches of the Childs Cup competitors shouted on bullhorns at the high school boat to get out of the way until it finally did.

Penn protested the intrusion to no avail.

“You never expect something like that to happen,” Penn coach Greg Myhr said. “I think everybody involved, coaches, rowers, officials, were all a little bit shell-shocked as far as what to do. The protest is that there was confusion and interference beyond a normal regatta situation.

“Had they restarted, that probably would have been the best course of action.”

Now the Quakers are left wondering what might have been.

“[Columbia] had a really good race,” Myhr said. “A very strong group. I think we could have held our own with Columbia, but to be honest, I really don’t know. That’s probably the biggest disappointment to this point — we really don’t know how we would have done.”

Fortunately, Myhr’s crew will find out how thePenn stacks up to the Lions as well as Yale next weekend at the Blackwell Cup on the Schuylkill.

“Nobody takes it in stride right away,” Myhr said. “When you feel like something happens out of your control that hurts your performance, there’s an immediate sense of indignation. But these guys are absolute gentlemen.”

The Tigers won all four eight-man crew races and the Quakers placed second in all three that didn’t feature a stray boat.

At least conditions were ideal, with all three teams enjoying minimal wind.

Penn did excel in the Varsity Fours, outdueling Columbia in 7:05.9 compared with the Lions’ 7:25.4.

“And [our men] are also incredibly talented, so I think after that initial anger subsides, we realized how unfortunate it is and that it wasn’t really anyone’s fault,” Myhr said. “It’s just something that happens. And we have plenty of racing left.”

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