The men’s heavyweight eight rows in the championship race in the 41st annual Head of the Charles Regatta this weekend.

The Head of the Charles Regatta might be the most famous of fall rowing events, but the Harvard oarsmen did not let that distinction get in the way of their having a good time this weekend.

The heavyweight varsity four—Harvard’s strongest entry in the regatta—carried their boat down to the Newell Boathouse dock wearing full pirate costumes, replete with eye patches for each of the oarsmen, gold hoop earrings, and black and red bandannas.

“It’s Head of the Charles—it’s a lot of fun,” said heavyweight varsity two-seat Andrew Boston. “I warmed up in the [eye] patch, but it started making me dizzy, so it had to be removed.”

Another Harvard varsity entry rowed the three-mile course in medical scrubs and masks, and the freshman lightweight men donned t-shirts that said, “A hungry dog is faster than a full one.”

Sixteen Harvard and Radcliffe entries raced this weekend, with the Harvard heavyweights taking home the most hardware in their first home regatta of the year.

HARVARD

For the second consecutive year, the Harvard varsity four bested all collegiate competition, coming in third place overall behind Thunderbird Rowing Club and Penn AC. The Crimson’s Championship Four entry was the first crew to start and completed the course in 16:55.06, with the sixth-place Wisconsin boat (17:14.62) the closest collegiate crew to Harvard on the afternoon.

“It went well,” said senior varsity stroke Adam Kosmicki. “We were a little heavy in the strong head wind, but it was fun.”

The Crimson had the luxury of starting first in the event, since last year’s Harvard varsity had secured a second-place finish to U.S. Rowing, which decided against competing this fall. Harvard began first and never looked back, using he boats positioned behind it to keep the pace up in the later stages of the race.

“It’s way better [to start first],” Kosmicki said. “You don’t get in any crashes, you get to pick your course, and you get to row your own race.”

The championship four, as it was last year, was composed of Harvard’s strongest four oarsmen. The Crimson spends the spring racing in eights, but Harvard coach Harry Parker chooses to mix up the lineups and the configurations for the Head of the Charles. The Championship Four event is the Crimson’s primary focus, with the Championship Eight event coming second.

“Harry’s really good at not tipping his hand,” Boston said. “We don’t want to give away any inches, but we’re just kind of playing our own game right now and keeping things quiet.”

Two Harvard entries in the Championship Eight event finished 13th and 15th, respectively, with the sophomore entry clocking a 15:25.16 time and Harvard’s varsity eight crossing in 15:27.12.

“I think we had a really good technical race,” said Anton Winter, who rowed in the sophomore entry. “It was really nice to row one last time with these guys.”

Perennial rival Princeton turned in a dominant performance in the Championship Eight event, crossing the line first in a time of 14:41.89, nearly five seconds in front of second-place Cambridge. California, which placed third behind Harvard and Princeton in last year’s IRA finals, was fourth with a time of 14:55.43.

The Harvard first freshman heavyweight entry matched the varsity four’s third-place finish, crossing the line in a time of 16:31.70 and trailing only Homberger RK Germania and Cal’s freshman eight.

On the lightweight side, the Crimson finished eighth in a competitive collegiate and club field featuring Harvard’s most competitive EARC rivals. Yale, the defending national champion, churned out a 15:37.19 clip, good for third place overall behind only Riverside Boat Club and New York Athletic Club. Navy followed right behind, coming across in 15:38.72.

“Navy and Yale had an amazing race today,” senior four-seat Wes Kauble said. “We’re not happy with our result, but it’s a good test.”

The lightweights were the seventh boat to start the course, and they dropped to eighth during the second mile. Though Harvard held a slight edge over Georgetown in the middle mile, the Hoyas surged in the third mile to outlast the Crimson (15:45.32) by just under three seconds at 15:42.52. Penn, last year’s bronze medalist at IRAs, edged out Harvard by 0.15 seconds.

“It didn’t feel as fast as it should have,” captain six-seat Dan Reid said. “We allowed ourselves to row at a lesser level than we are capable.”

The lightweights’ second varsity entry finished 13th with a time of 16:01.95.

RADCLIFFE

Three former Radcliffe standouts raced to first-place finishes on Saturday, as Michelle Guerette ’02 took first in the Championship Singles event and Caryn Davies ’05 and Anne Browning ’00 took home the Championship Doubles title.

In eights action, the Radcliffe lightweight varsity eight finished sixth with a time of 18:34. The lightweights kept pace with archrival Princeton throughout the first mile and trailed defending champion Wisconsin by just three seconds entering the heart of the course.

“I think we rowed really well,” said co-captain and stroke Sarah Bates. “For the point in the season that we’re at we did really well. Our goal now is to keep getting faster.”

The Black and White finished behind both Princeton and Wisconsin, but the event proved successful for a crew that had only enough members to race a varsity four a year ago.

“One of the strength of our team is definitely its depth,” Bates said. “We were talking today after the race about how exciting it is to know we have this big team that can get so much faster.”

The Radcliffe heavyweights turned in a 23rd place finish in the final race of the regatta, the Championship Women’s eight event. The Black and White were forced to juggle boat lineups just one day before the race, and this year’s varsity entry finished in 18:05.74, just 0.25 behind the Navy heavyweights. A Brown crew that started just behind the Radcliffe varsity caught up to the Black and White by the first mile marker, rattling the heavyweights.

“I think that sort of got to us a little bit,” said sophomore varsity two-seat Lizzie Rose. “But what’s nice about the Head of the Charles is that it’s a fun race and it’s great if you do well, but it doesn’t really matter if you don’t do as well as you hope. It has no bearing on how fast we’ll be in the spring.”

The heavyweights will look to rebound at next weekend’s Princeton chase, an annual encore to the Head of the Charles.

“We are slowly gaining speed—we haven’t peaked yet, but we will,” Rose added. “This will definitely get us going.”

—Staff writer Aidan E. Tait can be reached at atait@fas.harvard.edu.