The Loyola sailing team will be attending the Great Lakes qualifier this weekend and will have a chance to make or break the rest of their fall season in two days.

The 2021 Great Lakes championship qualifier will be held at the Chicago Yacht Club Belmont Station. Expected to attend are most of the Chicago area and central Midwest sailing teams from Indiana, Illinois, and Wisconsin. The top teams coming to this regatta are all from Chicago, though.

New Trier, Saint Ignatius, and Walter Payton are racing on their home waters at the Chicago Yacht Club. Jones College Prep, Whitney Young, and Lyons Township are coming up from nearby Columbia Yacht Club. Coming from the north suburbs are Evanston Township Highschool, Beacon Academy, Glenbrook South, and Loyola Academy.

Loyola hasn’t qualified for Great Lakes championships in over five years and has been relegated to sailing the lesser championships of Shepherd, or not sailing at all after the qualifier. This year’s scores at regattas have been promising, though, and it is very likely that Ramblers will qualify for championships.

Two days of sailing will prove challenging for sailors, though. The regatta is set to take place on Saturday, October 23, and Sunday, October 24. The two day aspect of the regatta will show which sailors can stay focused for two whole days of intense racing, with a scheduled 11 hours of racing total.

The conditions are also very different for the two days of racing. Saturday is forecasted to be a light and lumpy day, meaning that there is not going to be much wind but there are going to be a decent amount of small waves. Sunday is much different, with winds from 15-25 kts coming from the east creating 5-9 foot waves.

Loyola is sending a team of tive sailors this weekend to compete at the qualifier: Yago Echevarria-Robinson ‘22, Fiona Naughton ‘22, Natalia Bretones ‘23, James Sohigian ‘24, and Lia Nafe ‘25.

James said that he “expect[s] to qualify this weekend. The whole team has been putting in the work all season knowing that it all would lead to this weekend.”

If the sailing team does not place top four this weekend they will not qualify Great Lakes, and if they
don’t place top eight they will not qualify for Shepherd Championships. In that case their season is over.

Although it is likely that Loyola will qualify this weekend, other teams cannot be underestimated. Saint Ignatius has two of the best sailors in the Midwest at the moment. Both have gone to multiple national level events in the last 2 years.

New Trier, Jones, and Walter Payton also all have very strong teams that have beat Loyola in the past this season.

If you want to follow Loyola’s scores live this weekend, they’ll be posted and updated on
https://scores.hssailing.org/f21/autumn-classic-last-chance-great-lakes-champs/ after each race.