The weekend of 21-23 February marked the 18th Tuck Winter Carnival, hosted by the Amos Tuck School of Business. The carnival consisted of two key events, a skiing competition and a boat race event, appropriately surrounded by enough eating, drinking and partying activities to keep everybody happy. Given the sociable, as well as competitive atmosphere, it was no surprise HBS participated with two teams, while being supported by numerous fans that had made the trip up there.
On Friday evening, school band CW showed the other 15 participating business schools that HBS rocks. The supposed ‘battle of the bands’ at the eclectic Elektra nightclub (notice: “no rifles allowed”) never made it to voting after the Tuck and MIT bands hadn’t come close to the musical unity and crowd-rallying potential of CW. Instead, the lights went on at the rural closing time of 1 am; and we thought we were unlucky here in Boston!
The Saturday skiing competition showed a very successful HBS performance. Harvard A came in as silver medalist, only just behind the Tuck A team, whose home advantage was rumored to have stretched so far as to have performed some additional course reconnaissance.
Especially noteworthy was Will Azeff’s performance, who, next to organizing the HBS participation to the event, managed to come in second in the overall individual standings.
The HBS B-team fared well among B-teams, with definitely more exposure. It seemed to be the only team that had taken the name ‘carnival’ slightly seriously, although AJ Plotkin did not repeat his famous devilishly explosive start. Jim Verbeeten skied down like a seventies disco freak (those at new & old A&B’s ABBA party have seen it before), while Gaurav Misra got massive respect from all for bravely racing his second run in a skin-tight brownish outfit with a baggy extension.
A seemingly fancy dinner in a run-down hotel with stained curtains formed the prelude to Saturday night’s most serious event: the boatrace competition. Over dinner, HBS had continued its winning streak in downing a direct drinking challenge by Boston College. After the banquet, which had only been open to members of the skiing teams, the HBS fans joined to cheer for the HBS boatracers. To many a spectator, Charlotte Gosling’s drinking skills did not go unnoticed, but ultimately, the team was left stranded only two drinking bouts from winning the tournament.
