The Cornell student chapter of the American Society of Civil Engineers triumphed in the upstate New York region concrete canoe competition held at Union College April 8.
The Big Red crew, all undergraduate engineers, now goes on to the national competition in Golden, Colo., hosted by the Colorado School of Mines, in June. It will be Cornell's first visit to the nationals in a decade.
The concrete canoe contest entails designing and building a boat out of concrete. The team, dubbed C4 (for Cornell Concrete Canoe Company), first won "best design paper" in the competition, then "best presentation" and finally went on to place first in the men's sprint and the men's long-distance races. The team also placed fourth in the women's sprint and third in the four-person, co-ed race.
Nine canoes competed in the upstate region contest. Cornell's toughest competitor was the U.S. Military Academy, which took a first in the women's sprint race and seconds and thirds in other competitions. Other teams were entered by Union College, Hudson Valley Community College, Clarkson University, the University of Buffalo, Rochester Institute of Technology and Nassau Community College, which entered two teams.
Cornell men on the team were Troy Zezula, Dan Mullins, David Krell, Paras Shelawala and David Saunders. Cornell women were Martha DelCampo, Courtney Kimball, Karolyn Sutphin and Lucie Fougner. Team members not competing were Rob O'Neill, John Tam, Peter Velez and Ed Brillante.
The winning Cornell team suffered no major mishaps. The only damage that was inflicted on the boat occurred at the shore when a competitor's boat chipped a piece out of the gunwhale. But the canoe will be easily repaired in time for the finals, team members said.
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