The New Trier High School Freshman Girls crew battled choppy waters, fended off fierce competitors and ultimately won a gold medal at the top rowing tournament in the country on May 24 at the Scholastic Rowing Association of America’s Championship Regatta. The event was hosted on the Cooper River in New Jersey, just a few miles east of Philadelphia.

Christina Salvi, one of a team of eight rowers guided by a coxswain, says that before the final race the team was nervous, but confident. They had won previous tournaments together, including the Midwest Scholastic Rowing Regatta in Michigan just two weeks earlier. “After seeing how we performed at Midwest I had a gut feeling we’d win at nationals,” Salvi says.