CHICAGO – The Bainbridge High varsity sailing team traveled to the ISSA Baker Trophy Team Racing National Championship in Chicago over Memorial Day Weekend and captured eighth place.

The team earned its spot at the competition after claiming the title as Northwest District champions earlier in the season.

According to team co-captains Will Brown and Josh Rentz, the squad had set a goal of breaking into the top 10 nationally early on this year.

A highlight for the team was winning Saturday against St. George’s School, a private high school from Rhode Island, they said.

“After that race, we knew we could be competitive at the national level in team racing,” Brown said.

St. George’s School ended the regatta in fourth place, losing a tie-breaker for third.

Conditions were challenging both days of the competition, with light winds and vertical chop on Lake Michigan, which Coach Susie Kaseler described as “washing machine” waves.

On Saturday, the race committee managed to hold 52 races, not quite making it through one full rotation of 66 planned races.

Sunday’s weather was cloudy with no wind, and racing moved further out on Lake Michigan in pursuit of gusts.

The race committee found a few puffs early on, and Bainbridge sailed in the first very slow race.

The wind died, and the team bobbed on the water for several hours until the wind built enough to continue the rotation. The race committee finished the initial round robin but had no time for the usual gold, silver and bronze rounds. Instead, they ran a best-of-three sail-off between the two teams tied for first.

Shorecrest Preparatory School and St. Thomas Aquinas, two private schools and cross-state rivals from Florida, contended for the championship, with Shorecrest coming out on top.

Sailing for the BHS varsity team were co-captains Brown and Rentz, seniors Stasi Burzycki, Jackson McCoy, Hannah Harrison and Nick Dresel as well as juniors Blake Bentzen and Nicole Sanford.

“The success of these representatives of the sailing team at the Baker National Championship was greatly dependent on the work ethic and support of the entire team,” Kaseler said. “Any victory or defeat belongs to the team as a whole, and not to the representatives alone.”

The competitive roster for BHS this season also included seniors Lucas Burzycki and Francine Brownell; juniors Caelan Juckniess, Karl Anderson, Cole Garthwaite and Zach Mellin; sophomores  Elizabeth Rolfes, Harry Saliba and Kat Smith; as well as freshmen Christoph Webber, Olivia Mitchell, Quinn Ring, Sophia Kasper and Sophie Crandell.