A Rose Bowl win for Boston College as protest sinks Sage Hill HS

by Rich Roberts on 5 Jan 2009 Boston College's supremacy in college sailing resurfaced in the 24th annual Rose Bowl Regatta Sunday, and this win was special. 'It was redemption for us,' said Lauren Gillooly, a senior from Long Island, N.Y. who crewed for Tyler Sinks of San Diego on the Eagles' A boat.

BC thought it had won last year's event until, after the sailing was done, they lost a protest by Stanford that popped St. Mary's of Maryland to the top.

This year the significant protests involved contenders in the high school Gold division. Sage Hill of Costa Mesa, Calif., which led by 14 points after the first day, finished the racing seven up on defending champion Point Loma, but Mac Mace's A boat lost a protest by Point Loma's Caleb Paine as the windward boat failing to keep clear of an inside boat at a mark rounding.

That put Point Loma on top, but it had to survive a separate protest by Sage Hill for another incident and one by Santa Barbara, which was ruled 'not valid.'

When all of that smoke settled in the hearing room, Point Loma had its second consecutive Rose Bowl crown with 125 points, followed by longtime nemesis Newport Harbor, 132; Santa Barbara, 135; Sage Hill, 138, and Newport Harbor JV, 149.

In the college crowd, this year BC led College of Charleston and Massachusetts by only one and two points, respectively, after the first day.

'It was light [wind] and easy to get flustered and frustrated,' Sinks said. 'We were bailed out by our B boat [sailed by Briana Provancha and Katy Nastro].'

But Sinks and Gillooly settled well into Sunday's steady southwesterly breeze of 5-7 knots under brilliant blue skies blowing over the flat water of Alamitos Bay. They posted three seconds and two thirds in the five races. In the final tally BC had 86 points, followed by MIT, 95; Georgetown, 104; Charleston, 105; St. Mary's, 112, and UC Irvine, 114. among 24 teams.

Provancha, also from San Diego, said, 'We started off rough today [with a 15th and 12th in the first three races] and that got us a little unstable. Tyler said, 'Snap out of it!' We knew our speed was good and that if we got off the line we'd be all right.'

They led their nearest rival, MIT, by four points going into the last race, 'so I knew we had leverage,' Provancha said.

They finished fifth and sixth to seal the deal.

Dave Siegal, BC's assistant coach in the absence of head coach Greg Wilkinson, said, 'It was a pretty tight regatta, but we didn't want to match race [MIT] because we did have good speed. We were just going to be aware of where they were.'

More important, Provancha said, 'We went into this regatta [saying] 'no protests!' '

Starting in high school, Sinks has done six Rose Bowl regattas and Provancha seven, with a couple to go. Both are sophomores.

The event is the country's largest combined collegiate and high school regatta with more than 300 of the nation's best young sailors competing for 24 college entries from the East Coast to Hawaii and 52 high schools from throughout the state, some with multiple teams. All sailed two-person CFJ dinghies with male, female and coed crews competing equally.

The event was hosted by the USC sailing team, organized by the US Sailing Center of Long Beach and based at ABYC.

Complete results, photo gallery and more www.abyc.org/event.cfm?id=326