PHILADELPHIA – The Wisconsin women's rowing program will add a trio of trophies to the Porter Boathouse cases after the lightweight four won its race, and the lightweight eight and open four entries claimed second-place results at the Dad Vail Regatta. Racing took place on the Schuylkill River on Saturday.

The windy weather forced afternoon racing to get cancelled, but the Badgers got their morning finals in before racing was halted.

"Even with the weather, it was great racing today," lightweight coach Dusty Mattison said. "Definitely excited that we were able to go out there and perform the way that we did."

Wisconsin's lightweight four not only won the Dad Vails, which is named after a former Wisconsin men's rowing coach, it won the Robert Espeseth Trophy, named after the former Badger men's rowing great who is a USRowing Hall of Fame member as a three-time IRA varsity eight national champion and four-time U.S. Olympian.

The lightweight four won by nearly 10 seconds over second-place Boston University, clocking 7:18.951 over 2000 meters. BU crossed the line in 7:28.723. MIT, California, Brock and Penn State rounded out those that reached the grand final.

"It is really exciting to be Dad Vail champs in that event," Mattison stated. "It was a pretty competitive field from the heats all the way through the finals.

"They keep finding more speed and more rhythm together. They were really happy coming away with the win, but even more so taking that confidence into IRAs is really important."

The lightweight eight, racing in a final only, placed second of three schools. The Badgers' time of 6:31.136 was less than one second behind No. 5 Boston University for the Dad Vail crown. The Badgers beat out BU two weeks ago at the Eastern Sprints. Sixth-ranked MIT was third in 6:39.523.

"It looked like it was competitive all the way down," Mattison stated. "They were up a bit, and then going into the last 500 meters we had a little difficulty with the cox box. The rowers had a hard time hearing the coxswain, but no excuse there. We still should have been able to execute a little bit better sprint.

"The team may have been a little disappointed with the outcome, but performance-wise, they were happy. We know we still have a bit to work on and still have not executed our best race yet.

"The exciting thing is with the results across the board and results flipping at different races in lightweight rowing this year, it is really anyone's to take at IRAs."

In the open four, the Badgers were second behind Lafayette, who had gotten the better of UW in Friday morning's time trail. UW's lightweight entry finished just over four seconds behind the Lafayette openweight champs.

"They came in second behind a very fast Lafayette crew," Mattison stated. "We dealt with the wind better than they were able to the day before and kept it clean when it got a little choppier over the last 750 meters.

"Those women will continue to train for the IRAs and we will probably be looking at some of them for the IRA double."

Next up for the Badgers is the 2017 Intercollegiate Rowing Association (IRA) National Championships. The event is set for June 3-4 in Gold River, California.
"It was a great team effort and now we need to do a little more moving things around, potentially, to find the fastest three lineups.

"We have the potential to be on the medal stand at all three events at IRA and that is the goal."

Dad Vail Regatta
May 13, 2017
Philadelphia
Schuylkill River
2000 meters

Varsity Lightweight Eight
Grand Final (Dennis Kamrad Trophy)
1. Boston University, 6:30.347; 2. Wisconsin, 6:31.136; 3. MIT, 6:39.523
UW Lineup – Coxswain Eleanor Martin, Brianna Wynne, Agathe Denis, Grace Joyce, Mirha Girt, Kathryne Ruffalo, Janet Titzler, Alexandra Fochios, Marilyn Garberg

Varsity Lightweight Four
Grand Final (Robert Espeseth Trophy)
1. Wisconsin, 7:18.951; 2. Boston University, 7:28.723; 3. MIT, 7:33.821; 4. California, 7:36.390; 5. Brock, 7:44.280; 6. Penn State, 8:15.767
UW Lineup – Coxswain Anika Chatterjee, Claire Kelley, Brianna Ohm, Ariel Tallo, Payton James

Varsity Openweight Four
Grand Final (Margaret McNiff Trophy)
1. Lafayette, 7:14.416; 2. Wisconsin Lightweights, 7:18.481; 3. Drexel, 7:25.806; 4. Oklahoma City, 7:38.738; 5. Delaware, 7:40.786; 6. Saint Josephs, 7:47.313
UW Lineup – Coxswain Lucy Tasker, Jacqueline Jones, Anna Leach, Anna Dawley, Jenn Whitehill