This weekend, the team sailed at the Fall Foliage Regatta at UNH. UConn sailors Jen Lee (CLAS’17), Mike Rottier (ENG’15), Shannon Nardi (CLAS’16), and Corie Fay (CLAS’16) sailed 9 races in a combined fleet, and worked hard to end the day with a third place finish.
Because of the finish at Fall Foliage, the UConn Sailing Team improved its ranking and moved into the 18th-ranked team in the extremely competitive NEISA conference. This qualifies UConn to race at the Schell Trophy for the first time in four years. “Getting into the Schell is no easy task.” says Coach Brian Pracon, “You have to be top 18 in a conference that is made up of 11 of the top 20 schools in the country, not to mention the next 2 schools in our league who received votes to be top twenty.”
Pracon attributes this achievement to the hard work of the entire team throughout the semester. “Everyone that sailed this semester should be proud of what we did as a team! I want to thank everyone that helped in some way, shape, or form. Each time our sailors put a UConn pinny on to represent our school, it helps us. I know we have a small team now, but we will become a powerful team with everyone’s support. We have to start somewhere. ”
Getting the team to the Schell was one of Pracon’s key goals in his first year as coach for the UConn Sailing Team in the 2013-2014 season, and he’s proud of the hard work by the entire team to reach this goal.