This post was updated April 4 at 9:57 p.m.

The Bruins’ novice eight crew showed up for the rest of the team back home.

Freshman port Emma McDonald said the crew had learned from attending the regatta against USC on March 11, but the novice boat wanted to set a precedent this weekend.

“We really wanted to represent the team well and make sure that we’re showing up for the girls who were at home still putting in the work in the varsity boat,” McDonald said.

UCLA rowing (0-1) earned a third-place finish in the San Diego Crew Classic on Saturday and Sunday. The five-boat heat on Mission Bay also worked in favor of the Bruins last year as they secured a second-place finish.

UCLA trailed No. 5 Washington and British Columbia Saturday morning. The Bruins finished with a time of 7:37.349, leaving UC San Diego and San Diego behind.

Assistant coach Marija Medelinskaite said the boat performed well, considering it was its first race and it started practicing in the fall.

“They did a phenomenal job applying what they learned just a few months ago,” Medelinskaite said.

Sunday morning’s Grand Final was a repeat of Saturday’s Classic.

The novice eight boat placed third again behind Washington and British Columbia, finishing at 7:35.910. The Bruins also ran a comfortable lead ahead of UCSD, which finished at 7:52.14. In both races the Bruins had a 15-second lead on fourth-place UCSD.

The Toreros placed fifth with a time of 8:31.445.

Both Katz and McDonald said that the novice boat wanted to improve toward future races.

“We wanted to really show what our novice boat can do, and then be able to improve on that as we approach the novice event at Pac-12 and make sure that we’re representing UCLA really well throughout the race,” Katz said.

Katz added that the highlight of the races was getting to improve from the first race and fight through the regatta.

Two competitions down, the Bruins are set to head to the Big Ten Invitational on Friday and Saturday.