Heavyweights Overcome Mercer Conditions, Technical Issue, To Post Another IRA Top-5 Finish

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The Princeton heavyweights proved they could bounce back from adversity once before, so they knew they could do it again. This time, however, that resilience had to come in the span of minutes, not days.

Princeton, which had lost its final three races of the regular season, made a strong showing at Eastern Sprints, where it came within a second of a silver medal and made big gains on all three Ivy boats that had beaten them earlier. They carried that same resilience and growth through two challenging races at the IRA Championships this weekend, and into Sunday's grand final on a rough Mercer Lake course.

And if that wasn't enough of an obstacle, they dealt with a mechanical issue minutes before the race that needed to be repaired on the water. It may have delayed the start of the race, but the veteran experience within the boat didn't allow it to dampen the energy.

"This is the situation, so let's grab the bull by the horns and have a go," senior stroke Tom George said. "I'm incredibly proud. Obviously you want to win, and that's my last race as a Tiger, which is incredibly hard to take. That's more because I've loved racing as a Princeton Tiger over the last four years. You want to win, but you take what you get, and I'm incredibly happy with what we did."

Princeton was able to flip one of its previous results in the grand final, but that wasn't enough to get the varsity eight back to the medal stand. Yale repeated its 2017 championship with a wire-to-wire victory over Washington, while California was a comfortable third.

That left a trio of Ivy League boats, and it was Princeton and Harvard battling for the fourth spot over the final 20 strokes. The Crimson held on by less than half a second, but Princeton topped Brown by more than three seconds to grab its first win over the Bears in 2018. That result helped Princeton earn a fifth-place finish in the Ten Eyck team points race with 158 points.

"I'm incredible proud of the heart and character of the team," George said. "Losing races during the regular season is hard, but championships are what you want. You want to be challenging at Sprints, and at the IRA, and we really did that. The way the boys went after it over the last three weeks was phenomenal. I can't really put it into words how proud I am of the guys."

The challenging conditions on Mercer Lake made every race a battle, and it even cancelled other races. The 2V, which won gold at Eastern Sprints, couldn't establish a pace that could keep with the lead pack of Washington and California, and it ultimately placed sixth, less than three seconds behind Northeastern.

The 3V, which fell just short of another grand final, was the clear class of the petite final, topping runner-up Dartmouth by more than seven seconds and third-place Brown by more than 16 seconds. The V4 final was cancelled due to unsafe conditions on Mercer Lake.

VARSITY EIGHT GRAND FINAL
Yale 6:01.648
Washington 6:04.337
California 6:08.911
Harvard 6:10.717
Princeton 6:11.161
Brown 6:14.272

SECOND VARSITY EIGHT GRAND FINAL
Washington 6:23.404
California 6:25.427
Yale 6:31.079
Harvard 6:39.773
Northeastern 6:39.834
Princeton 6:42.518

THIRD VARSITY EIGHT PETITE FINAL
Princeton 7:09.806
Dartmouth 7:16.988
Brown 7:26.394
Syracuse 7:31.604
Wisconsin 7:39.624
Cornell 7:50.726

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