Seattle, WA – The Lehigh Women’s crew team traveled to Seattle this weekend to race at the Husky Invite. The team competed against split squads from the University of Washington (UW) ranked 11th and Washington State University (WSU) ranked 16th due to the fact that some of their top rowers were racing in the Windermier Cup.
After the first 20 strokes all three crew settled to their base rate and were within a seat or two. The Lehigh women traded seats with both teams for the first 500 meters until WSU took the lead and kept it for good leaving a two boat race between UW and Lehigh. Lehigh had a one seat advantage entering the last 600 meters and Seattle’s famous canal know as “the cut.” Here UW took advantage of its home course and made the last move to edged out the Lehigh women by 1.8 seconds. The women’s eight included coxswain, Megan Vasta (Sr.), stroke-seat, Lauren Chanatry (Sr.), 7-seat, Sara Brams-Miller (Sr.), 6-seat, Cara Skola (Sr.), 5-seat, Margaret O’Shea (Jr.), 4-seat, Denise Julian (So.), 3-seat, Sabrina Slater (Sr.), 2-seat, Becca Guzman (So.) and bow-seat, Pam Lee (Sr.).
Lehigh’s Varsity Men also lined up against a split squad of the University of Washington’s 4th ranked team due to the Windermier Cup racing. The Huskies also entered a freshman crew to make a three boat race. The Mountain Hawks came prepared and shot from the starting line, taking a small lead after only 10 strokes. The Lehigh boat kept pressing, and pulled away from Washington’s freshmen boat while keeping a seat on the Huskies varsity representatives. After the 1000 meter mark, the Hawks took a move and pushed up four seats on the Huskies varsity, and had open water on the Huskies freshman crew. As the boats entered “the cut” the Huskies varsity contingent pushed back even, while the freshmen trailed by two lengths open. The Husky boat made its final move and pushed through the Lehigh men’s eight. The race ended with the Huskies out front, Lehigh five seconds back, and the final Husky boat another three lengths behind. Lehigh’s boat consisted of coxswain, Dave Highhill (Jr.), stroke-seat, Jon Winter (Jr.), 7-seat, Matt Galuska (Jr.), 6-seat, Chris Hause (So.), 5-seat, Rich Sherman (Sr.), 4-seat, Andrew Younghein (So.), 3-seat, Mark Chandler (So.), 2-seat, Matt Kampner (Sr.) and bow-seat, Mike Villano (Jr.).
Women’s Varsity 8
Washington State University 6:51.1University of Washington 7:00.6Lehigh University 7:02.4
Men’s Varsity 8
University of Washington 5:59.1Lehigh University 6:04.4University of Washington Freshmen 6:16.1
