Redwood City, Ca- The Bruins went north this weekend for the Pac-10 Challenge hosted by Stanford University. It was a two day event in dual race format. The varsity started things off with UC-San Diego. In flat conditions with a steady headwind the Bruins pushed out to a one length lead by the 500 meter mark. “We had a pretty good start but our shift to base rate really helped us push to the lead,” said Brad Stapleton, the UCLA Stroke.

UCLA extended its lead to a couple of seats open water through the middle 1000 meters and held that margin to the finish beating the Tritons by 4.5 seconds. The Frosh/Novices were next as they lined up against Gonzaga. Gonzaga took an early lead and never looked back as the Bruins could not match their pace. The afternoon brought more races and more wind. There was a steady 15-20mph headwind with gusts well over that for the crews to deal with.

The Varsity 8 came out for its second race of the day against Cornell University. “Cornell just took off on us at the start,” stated coxswain Sarah Koff. Cornell extended their lead throughout the race and won easily. Darius Faizi,”When they jumped out it rattled us and we never got into our race plan. We also didn’t handle the conditions the way we should have.”

The day ended with the UCLA 2V racing the Cal frosh. “We had a great start and were only a few seats down through 750 meters,” coxswain Jennie Page. Powered by two Olympians from Serbia the Cal freshman took over and pulled away to open water by the halfway point. The pace was too much for the Bruins and Cal won by 22 seconds.

“It was a tough match up for the JV and the freshman had a rough one, said Coach Mokha but I was pleased to see the Varsity win. UC-San Diego has become a recent rival which is made for some great competition.”

Sunday’s racing saw the UCLA Frosh lose to Orange Coast and the 2V go down to Stanford. The much anticipated match up between the Bruins and Gonzaga’s Varsity started with a Gonzaga oarsman catching an over the head crab on the first stroke of the race that turned their shell sideways. UCLA stopped rowing but the officials said nothing. “I stopped the guys thinking there was breakage, said coxswain Sarah Koff, when the officials didn’t stop the race my stroke yelled to go and we continued our start.”

Both crews continued the race with UCLA winning by 20 seconds. Coach Mokha, “When I heard what had happened I got the crew together and asked them if they wanted to re-row the race, they agreed. So I approached Dan, Gonzaga’s coach, and offered to race again.”

The regatta officials okayed the re-row and put it on the schedule for the last race before the lunch break.

The second race went off without a hitch and the Bruins surged to a half length lead by the 500, extending it by three lengths through the middle 1000 meters and finished 11 seconds ahead of Gonzaga. “I am glad we raced again, said Martin Reschke, it was a good race for us and the right thing to do.”

“We came up here to race, especially with Gonzaga, who we didn’t get to race last year, said coach Mokha. Winning like we did the first time just wasn’t right plus we were anticipating two evenly matched crews and I wanted my guys to be tested. They past that test.”