Although the rowing team had some strong races at Saturday's Head of the Chattahoochee in Gainsville, Ga., it was also defeated by some familiar rivals.
The highlights of the day were the performances of the championship four and pair boats. The champ four-rowed by sophomores Joanna Hingle, Katie Lakin, Caroline Diemar and Amelia Booth-won the gold medal in a time of 18:31.6, just one second ahead of second-place Clemson.
"We felt really smooth, powerful and together in that race," Hingle said. "Winning by one second is not very much in a race that long, but we rowed well as a team."
Caroline Diemar also attributed the success of the champ four to their teamwork.
"We have a great four," she said. "We all work really well together and we felt very strong on Saturday."
In addition to winning the champ four race, the same four also rowed in the Pairs. Hingle and Lakin won the gold medal with a time of 20:06.1, and Diemar and Booth finished just eight seconds behind their teammates to pick up the silver medal. Their closest competition was the University of Texas boat, which had a time of 20:29.1.
"It was a really tough race between the Duke boats," Hingle said. "Joanna and I raced well, but we were also really proud of Caroline and Amelia."
The most disappointing race came at the end of the day in the women's championship eight. Duke's A boat finished in fourth place with a time of 17:17.3 behind Texas (16:43.7), North Carolina (16:59.2) and Clemson (16:59.6) The Blue Devils had defeated both the Tar Heels and the Tigers earlier in the year at the Lake Michie Invitational in September and the Head of Lake Hartwell in October.
"We definitely could have done better than fourth," Hingle said. "It was our third race of the day, it was raining and we were all pretty tired."
In other major races on Saturday, the Blue Devils finished first in the freshman novice eight, defeating second-place Texas by over five seconds. Duke junior Maren Betts finished third in the Championship single race (22:51.6) and junior Mary Beth Nebel finished sixth (25:17.0).
The Blue Devils have one more face this fall-next weekend at the Rivanna Romp in Charlottesville, Va. There they will have a chance to avenge their loses to UNC and Clemson in the championship eight.
"We're looking forward to racing UNC and Clemson again," Diemar said. "It's a really big race and hopefully we can go get them."
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