GRAND JUNCTION, Colorado– Four members of BYU’s swim and dive team, Erica Lienhard, Matt Denkers, Preston Jenkins, and Payton Sorenson, won their various events Friday evening at the Intermountain Shootout.
“It was exciting to see our team perform so well at the first day of this invitational,” head BYU coach John Brooks said. “We are still early on in our season, but we continue to swim faster and faster. It was a good start to the first session of the meet and we look forward to continuing that tomorrow.”
Preston Jenkins, claimed BYU’s first win in the fourth event of the evening.Paired with a winning time of 1:39:29 in the men’s 200-yard freestyle, Jenkins also claimed first in the men’s 100-yard backstroke with a time of 50.27. Rainer Ng, one of the team captains, followed Jenkins with a third place finish, clocking a time of 51.00 in that backstroke.
Teammate Payton Sorenson, a junior from Mesa, Arizona, took first in the men’s 50-yard freestyle, finishing the race in 20.57
Freshman, Tiare Coker, from California, finished third in two of her three events Friday evening. She recorded times of 1:53.25 in the women’s 200-yard freestyle and 24.02 in the women’s 50-yard freestyle.
Riley Merrill and teammate Kelly Hatanaka pulled in the third and fourth place standings for BYU in the women’s 400-yard individual medley. Merrill took third in the event with a time of 4:34.91 and Hatanaka finished with 4:37.64. Miller also finished third in the women’s 100-yard individual medley, with a time of 59:79.
The diving team claimed two of the four wins for BYU in the only two diving events that were held Friday evening.
“We had some outstanding performances this evening,” head BYU diving coach Tyce Rouston said. “Having two wins in one day is certainly promising. We are glad to be done with the first-day jitters, evaluate how we have performed, and look to continue improving.”
Erika Lienhard, a senior from Escondido, California, had her first invitational win Friday evening. Participating in the women’s 1-meter event, she had a final score of 229.35.
Matt Denkers and Kevin Dreesen took first and second in the men’s 3-meter event. Denkers had a final score of 296.15 and Dreesen followed close behind with a total of 289.80.
The Colorado Mesa Shootout will continue Saturday morning at 11:00 a.m., MDT. Live stats can be found here and live video feed can be found on this link.