Texas Sailing

The Team went to California this weekend to race in the North-South intersectional. North South is a large intersectional on the west coast which has just been turned into the Pacific Coast Championship. The regatta was run on a lake in the hills above Santa Monica. It is a unique regatta in the way that each team brings there own boats. We were able to use the USC boats to compete in the regatta. After the first day of racing consisting of two races in each division we were in 11th place out of 18 teams. The second day was better with stronger breeze ranging from 5 to 10 knots. We raced four races in each division and moved into sixth place. We were lucky to have the coaching and advice of Travis Tomas a UT Alumni who came up from L.A. to support the team. The results for the regatta can found on the Fall 2002 results page.  

 

The Team was split on this weekend with part of the team going to R.I. and part going to New Orleans. The New Orleans group was set on qualifying for the major intersectional in Charleston in the Spring. They faced nine teams and won the one day regatta by seven points. Spencer and Jessie got second in A division and Michael and Cristina  got first in B division.  

 

The Sloop team won the qualifier in Dallas back in the beginning of October get the chance to go to Rhode Island to compete in College Nationals. It was the first time UT had qualified for nationals in Sloop in many years. The event is a three day event that was run out of the prestigious New York Yacht Club this year. It was a very cold regatta with wind chill factors making the temperature close to freezing. The team had a rough couple days with the high winds but managed to get everything figured out for the last race to get a fourth. They finished ninth overall out of ten teams and learned a lot.   

The team spent the first part of the semester getting new people familiar with the team and SEISA. The first regatta that we were out to win was our home regatta the Kathryn Hammond Intersectional. Five teams showed to the intersectional with two out of state teams from Florida and North Carolina. The competition was good having the top teams from our district with good out of state teams. On both days there were light and shifty winds. It came down to the last set of the day in which each division sailed one race to decide the winner of the regatta. After all scores were totaled UT won by a point and A&M got a close second.    

 

Over the past couple week the UT sailing team has been competing in Hawaii for college sailing nationals. The team qualified for team racing nationals and fleet racing nationals. The team racing team got 11th out of twelve after a three way tie breaker for 9th. The women's team got 16th in A division and 15th in B division making them 16th over all. This was a big improvement from last year where the women got 18th on the Charles River in Boston.

 

UT sailing team saves lives

March 5, 2002

Members of the University of Texas Sailing Team were part of a group rescue effort in Offatts Bayou on February 23. To read more about the rescue follow the links bellow.

UT Papers description of the event in PDF format

Description of the event by the Senate of The State of Texas