Image Credit: Lisa Worthy
Despite grey skies in Cherry Hill, the racing was electric on the first day of the IRA National Championships. With high-speed conditions, multiple teams threatened the 5:30 barrier in the top boats, with a few very exciting races as the field condensed. With comebacks aplenty, it sets us up for an intriguing weekend on the Cooper River.
In the blue-riband varsity eight, the opening heats provided a key salvo for the top contenders, as gold medal contenders sought to progress safely while making a statement to their opponents on Sunday. Regarding the latter, #4 Dartmouth made a splash, rowing through #5 Princeton to post the fastest morning time.
For others, the heat was the most important race of the weekend, as securing a top-12 finish would define the weekend as a success. The closest of these races was pegged to be in the fourth heat as #12 Wisconsin and #13 Boston University had round four for their 2025 rivalry. However, the shock of the day came from #19 Navy, who peaked at just the right time. Their disappointing season was erased as a killer final 500 metres saw the midshipmen claim the final spot in the AB semifinals, showing that Steve Gladstone’s magic touch remains as good as ever. In the other heats, the top three seeds all prevailed, though #9 Penn and #10 Northeastern will have an easier semifinal than seeded, as they pushed #7 Brown and #8 Stanford, respectively, down into third.
In the lower eights, there were no such surprises as the top three seeds progressed in each heat, with Harvard and Washington posting the fastest times in the second and third eights, respectively.
In the lightweight men’s events, the top three from each heat will progress straight into Sunday’s final, and all eyes were on Harvard who continued their undefeated season across the two eights, posting the fastest time across in first eight heats, while Penn got the upper hand in the second eights, finishing 0.8 seconds faster in the alternate heat.
The absence of Cornell means we have a different lineup in the finals compared to the Eastern Sprints, and it was Navy who took the advantage, claiming the final spot in the first lightweight eight. Meanwhile, Dartmouth claimed the spare place in the second varsity eight, coming second in a tight heat, one of the races of the day. One notable result of this was for MIT as they reached the premier race
Division three has a similar setup, with Saturday’s finals being determined today, and it will be an all-NESCAC final in the first varsity, with the New England powerhouses dominating the field. Trinity’s 5:45 in the first heat was the fastest across the two heats and would have been competitive in the division one field. Colby edged Marietta in the second heat to claim the last spot in the grand final, a substantial achievement in their first championship in the eights, much to the delight of their large travelling support. In the second eight, the seeding meant that the NESCAC sweep could not be repeated with Ithaca finishing third in the first heat, while Bates missed out in the second.
The men’s heavyweight and lightweight fours had a very different day, finishing the morning’s session with a time trial before their semifinals in the afternoon. This event tends to be a mixture of development boats and top crews from smaller programmes but qualifying for the grand final was exclusively fourth-ranked crews, demonstrating that the top programmes have both phenomenal top-end speed as well as depth. In the second semifinals, Brown won a tight battle to qualify over Saint Joseph’s, San Diego and Marist while Penn rowed through Dartmouth for the final spot from the third semifinal.
For tomorrow’s racing, the focus will be on the semifinal in the heavyweight division one boats, with two stacked lineups in the varsity eights. The finals in the fours will provide the first round of California vs Washington vs Harvard (one of the prevailing narratives of this regatta) while the division three champions will be crowned.
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