Lightweight crew beats Knights, Hawks at home

Despite falling behind in the first 1000 meters, the Penn lightweight rowing team maintained its composure.

After passing the Strawberry Mansion Bridge around the halfway point of the race, the Quakers made their move against Rutgers and Saint Joseph's and never looked back.

The Red and Blue pulled away to defend its Lev-Brett Bowl title for 2006.

"You can't get frustrated if you're not leading at the end of three minutes," Penn coach Mike Irwin said.

"As much fun as it is to be leading halfway through the race, it's much more fun to be leading at the end of the race."

The varsity eight finished in 6:45.2, while St. Joe's and Rutgers trailed with 6:48.3 and 6:56.2, respectively.

"Maintaining our composure and being confident enough to push through the middle of the race to beat the other teams in the second half were important for our win," senior captain Tim Mahoney said.

"We had a sloppy race, but we had a great win. It's always exciting to start the season off with a win," Mahoney added.

Penn's second varsity eight finished last behind Rutgers and St. Joe's, while Rutgers edged the Quakers by one tenth of a second, or four inches, in the novice eight race.

Saturday's varsity win was determined in part by which team could best handle the elements.

"The conditions weren't ideal; there were a lot of strong headwinds of about 20 miles per hour and a lot of chop," Mahoney said.

"All three boats were pretty close in speed, and it was going to come down to who could make the fewest mistakes down the stretch," Irwin added. "It was nice to start the year off with a win, even though we weren't able to operate at full speed."

Penn's early-season success can be attributed to experience and confidence.

"The biggest thing we learned last year and this fall is being more composed when we race and not getting flustered or frustrated if we are down early in a race like we were today," Irwin said. "We found a way to start chipping our way back into the lead. We need to be composed enough to not get discouraged when we know that almost every race we have will come down to the last 30 strokes."

Next weekend, the Red and Blue travels to Ithaca, N.Y., to face Cornell and Harvard in the Matthews-Leonard Cup. Last spring, Harvard won the Eastern Sprints and Cornell finished second at the National Championships.

"Harvard and Cornell are always really fast crews," Mahoney said.

"If we want to compete with Cornell and Harvard, we had better have a tremendous race," Irwin said. "We don't have the depth or the experience that those two crews have, so we're going to have to outwork them and be better-prepared with intensity. We can't bring anything less than our full capacity and expect to come home with the trophy."

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