Penn heavyweight and lightweight rowing hit the water at Head of the Charles Regatta

Oars at the ready, get set, go! Penn lightweight and heavyweight rowing took off at the Head of the Charles Regatta this past Sunday in Boston. 

Lightweight rowing finished third in both the varsity fours and eights divisions. The headline of the day, however, came from the heavyweight team. The Quakers had two boats performing in the Men’s Championship Eights division, but to the team’s despair, only one would cross the finish line.

Penn’s A and B boats were off to a fast start in the fall heavyweight rowing season. Scheduled to compete in one of the final races of the day, the rowers across the two boats were eager to begin their race on Sunday afternoon.

The A boat was manned by freshmen Luke Putter and Dylan McConnell; sophomores Marco Dri, Leo Goez, and Hal Hunter; and seniors Cole Riedinger, Austin Straley, Lars Finlayson, and George Rodgers. But Penn’s fastest crew would ultimately fail to complete the race after suffering a boat malfunction — making it the only boat to not complete the course out of 29 total competitors.

“It happened just before the halfway mark of the race. They lost their steering [of] the boat, which is especially critical for a very windy, curvy course like Head of the Charles,” heavyweight rowing coach Al Monte said. “That destabilized us to the point where we couldn’t manage to get to the finish line. It was unfortunate, for sure, and not what anyone foresaw the day to look like.”

While the malfunction was a big blow, the fall season is the most opportune moment for a calamity like this to occur. Since the spring season is when the biggest races take place and when national championships are won, the fall season serves as a preparation phase for what is to come. Crew compositions are constantly changing, conditioning is nowhere near perfect, and team chemistry is being built, allowing Monte to use this as a learning experience ahead of the team’s next outing.

“There’s been an air of optimism for the entirety of the fall,” Monte said. “We graduated a big, talented class last year that did a great job of developing over their time at Penn. We’ve seen real improvement over the past six weeks, especially for some of the younger guys. We have to train like we’re behind, like we have something to prove.”

The heavyweight B boat finished 23rd in the championship eights. The B boat was composed of freshman Caillen Pieckenhagen; sophomores Sam Fowlie and Oscar St. Pierre; juniors Red Staunton, Cole Bruen, and James Glomb; and seniors Tommy Schrieber, Matt Radell, and Hailey Kim. Although it placed in the bottom half of the regatta, the B crew was able to finish ahead of some A boats from rival programs. Ultimately, Harvard’s A boat performed the best out of the Ancient Eight, placing third overall. Considering the Crimson’s familiarity with the course, a strong performance was to be expected.

“They rowed an aggressive race. They beat a couple of Ivy JV crews that beat us last year in the Head of the Charles. I give those guys a lot of credit for rowing hard and tough,” Monte said. “I think they thought that the race was representative of where they’ve been training, but they also felt like it wasn’t their best effort. We’re kind of in the zone where we need to be, but just like the varsity, we still have to make that progress if we’re going to supersede our rivals.”

Lightweight rowing fared well in its opening two races. Penn’s A and B boats finished third and 10th, respectively, in the Men’s Lightweight Fours race, with the A crew trailing only Harvard and Cornell in the 12-team regatta. Freshmen Henry Alston and Elias Tejpaul, juniors Dylan Folan and Will Drinkall, and senior Carly Yang finished in the top three. 

The lightweight eights race told a similar story. Penn’s A crew again finished third, this time trailing Harvard in first place and Cornell in second. Lightweight rowing coach Colin Farrell was happy with the Quakers’ sole boat’s performance in this difficult 10-team contest. The Red and Blue finished ahead of two Princeton boats, as well as Dartmouth and Yale. The team’s strong showing puts it on par with the top Ivy League crews at this preparation stage of the season. 

Heavyweight and lightweight rowing will close the fall portion of the rowing season at the Princeton 3-Mile Chase on Sunday, Nov. 2.