Penn Sports Plus: Penn Sailing

For this week's Penn Sports Plus, we're all aboard with Penn Sailing captain Jack Swikart as he tells us what his sport is all about.

How does one join Penn Sailing?

Penn Sailing takes new members at the start of both the fall and spring semester, since sailing is a two-season sport. Prior experience is great, but certainly not necessary - in fact most of our new members have little to no experience at all. We always have a booth at the activities fair and a website (pennsailing.org) with contact info for the team if you miss the activities fair.

Where do you practice?

The team practices four or five days a week out of the Corinthian Yacht Club of Philadelphia, which is about 15-20 minutes by carpool from campus. It's an ideal place for sailing since the Delaware River is much wider than the Schuylkill, and gives us the room we need to maneuver.

What's the best moment the team has had?

It's tough to narrow it down to just one moment, but since I joined in the fall of last year, the best moment was beating out Cornell for the final spot in the 2011 Atlantic Coast Championships (the biggest regatta of the fall season). It really felt great to qualify for such a high-caliber event and have something to show for all of our effort that season.

What is a sailing tournament like?

Tournaments in sailing (like rowing) are known as regattas, and vary widely in terms of competitiveness and intensity. Some events, such as qualifiers and conference championships, are very intense and the competition is top-notch. On the other hand more recreationally-focused regattas, such as the Philly Fleet Race which we host each fall, are fairly laid-back and are great for just enjoying the activity of racing sailboats.

How competitive is Penn's squad?

Penn's team is very competitive every year. We've won the Mid-Atlantic Club Championships three of the last four years, and have even been nationally ranked as recently as last spring, when Sailing World magazine ranked us 23rd in the nation among all college sailing teams, club or varsity. Even though it's tough to keep up with the varsity teams, we try our best and most of all, we have fun.