The Ridgewood Crew all-junior boat of Uhmjoo Han,, Michael Shkop, Matthew Moomjy, and Luciano Saladino posted a scorching fast victory in the Boys JV 4x race, winning the flight. (Photo Credit: Mark Riedel)
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Philadelphia PA, Ridgewood Crew roared out of the gate this past Sunday in its first competition of the 2025 spring sprint season on the Schuylkill River, winning 10 out of its 15 races. Sunday’s regatta was the fourth in the five-race Manny Flick / Horvat series, which serves as a challenging, weekly tune-up for the state and regional championships later in the season. Each race involves a single trip down a 1,500-meter course, with teams split up into separate flights or heats.
Ridgewood’s performance was, by far, the most dominant of the day. In a field of 460 entries from 74 clubs across four states, Ridgewood’s 10 individual flight wins were more than any other club. Conestoga Crew Club, which fielded the most entries on Sunday with 17, had seven flight wins, second-most overall. Only one other team reached five victories.
“For our first race of the spring season, we performed incredibly well across every age and experience level,” said Ridgewood Crew Head Coach Boris Roque-Alvarez. “We have a large number of novice rowers on the team right now and they all showed a great amount of poise and determination in finishing at the top of their races, especially since this is the first on-the-water competition for many of them.”
Roque-Alvarez added: “They have great leaders to look up to, as our junior varsity and varsity rowers set a high standard for excellence today by winning so many of their races.”
Freshmen rowers Marelia Leou and Nicole Manevich set the winning tone for the day in Ridgewood’s first event. The pair slid across the finish line first in their flight of the Girls Freshman/Novice 2x race (7:00.460).
The remainder of the Ridgewood’s female rowers soon followed suit. The Girls Novice 4x boat of junior Ilaria Cupi, sophomores Tinsley Loonam and Hope Martino, and freshman Zurie Yela claimed victory less than an hour later (6:16.020) .
To close out the morning races, the veteran duo of senior Julia Smith and junior Maya Ashwin secured the Ridgewood girls’ triple crown for the day with their flight win in the Varsity 2x race.
In the afternoon session, the Ridgewood boys got their chance to shine.
Kicking things off, the all-9th grade quad of Graham Richardson, David Pasternak, Isaac Reynolds, and Kai Bissie found the finish line first in their flight of the Boys Freshman 4x race (4:53.190).
Just minutes later, Ridgewood’s two Boys Novice 4x boats scored first and second-place finishes, respectively. Sophomore Brendan Finucane, alongside freshmen George Rivkin, Conner Cinco, and Alex Evers got the win (5:07.980), while sophomores Vicken Ezik and Edward Amores, and freshmen Matt Bessonov and Sam Rizzo, were runners-up in their flight (5:35.590).
Ridgewood’s narrowest victory of the day came in the Boys JV 1x event. There, junior Andrii Onizhuk eked out a thrilling, photo-finish win by a margin of just .08 seconds, after racing side by side with the ultimate runner-up for the last 500 meters (5:27.730).
By contrast, the all-junior quad of Uhmjoo Han, Michael Shkop, Matt Moomjy, and Luciano Saladino put on a statement performance in the Boys JV 4x event. Racing in the final of three flights, they cruised to first place, winning by more than 13 seconds (4:28.870).
In the double sculling events, the Ridgewood sophomore duo of Andrew Segura and Atticus Smith posted the quickest time in their flight of the Boys JV 2x race (5:07.720), while Ridgewood juniors Daniel Hept and James Ryan also took first in their Boys Lightweight 2x flight (4:57.240).
The lightweight duo of Paul Hallowell and Oliver Ilin-Schneider, both juniors, took second in their Boys Lightweight 2x flight (5:09.970), just ahead of sophomore teammates Gabe Dozortsev and Kamran Sarmad, who finished third (5:20.690) in the same flight.
Seniors Will Carroll (5:20.890) and Gryphon Smith (5:39.010) scored a pair of second-place finishes in their respective flights of the Boys Varsity 1x event.
Ridgewood’s fastest boat on Sunday also sealed the team’s final victory. In the Boys Varsity 4x event, senior Lucas Evers, juniors Will Nasr and Sam Scharfenberg, and sophomore Tristan Riedel easily pulled away from competition in their flight to push the team’s overall win total to double digits (4:28.380).
Full times and results for Ridgewood Crew at the 2025 4th Manny Flick / Horvat Series can be found at https://www.regattacentral.com/regatta/results2?job_id=9547&org_id=0.
In the program’s 20-year history, Ridgewood Crew rowers have competed and excelled in both national and international competitions and its athletes have attracted interest from top rowing colleges and universities around the country. Ridgewood Crew offers several ways for you to experience our mission: join the team, volunteer, or donate. Student athlete programs begin with Learn-To-Row for middle schoolers. For more information contact Ridgewood Crew at http://www.ridgewoodcrew.com.
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