The Massachusetts rowing team will race five boats this weekend in the 70th annual Dad Vail Regatta in Philadelphia.
Over 3,000 rowers from 115 schools, from the United States and Canada, are expected to compete in 2,000-meter course on the Schuylkill River. The Dad Vail Regatta is the largest in the United States and will host more than 150 races in the two-day event.
The Minutewomen will race their Varsity 8, Second Varsity 8, Varsity 4, Novice 8 and Novice 4 boats. All five boats will race in heats on Friday, and if they advance, will race in the semifinals and finals on Saturday.
The first boat to race for UMass on Friday will be the Varsity 4. There will be nine heats and 49 other boats taking place in the heats, with UMass racing in the final heat in lane six.
The top two boats in each heat will advance to the three semifinal heats with the top two in each semifinal advancing to the finals.
The Minutewomen's Varsity 8 will race with 39 other boats in the seven preliminaries heats.
The schools that finish from third to fifth will move on to the repachage later on Friday and will race in four separate heats. The fastest boat in each of the repachage will move on to the semifinals.
The Novice 4 race will have 45 schools competing in nine heats. UMass will race in lane one of the seventh heat. The Novice 4 will follow the same structure for the semifinals and finals as the Varsity 4. The seventh heat of the preliminaries will also include John Carroll, Marquette, Emory and Carnegie Mellon.
One of the more successful boats for the Minutewomen in the past few weeks, the Novice 8, will race in the third heat of its six heat preliminaries. The Novice 8 will race against Lafayette, Philadelphia, Georgia Tech and Stony Brook for the opportunity to advance to the semifinals.
The last race for the Minutewomen on Friday will be the Second Varsity 8, which has received a top seed in the weekend's regatta. UMass will race against 25 other schools competing in five heats, with Delaware, Marist, George Mason and Army in its heat.
The Minutewomen's Varsity 8 finished third last year while the Second Varsity 8 took fourth. UMass may struggle to repeat the success from a year ago.
"The Second Varsity 8 is expected to do very well, but the rest of the boats are a crapshoot," UMass head coach Jim Dietz said. "The Varsity 8 could really struggle."
There is a possibility of rain for Friday's action but that should not affect the Minutewomen as long as there is not a strong wind, according to Dietz.
Jeff R. Larnard can be reached at jlarnard@student.umass.edu.
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