Sarty leads swimmers on day 1 of nationals

Isabel Sarty (halifax, NS) swam a personal best time of 2:03.50 to finish fourth in the 200m freestyle A Final on day one of the 2020 U SPORTS Swimming Championship. Lise Cinq-Mars (Aurora, ON) also earned a spot in an A Final, placing eighth in the 100m butterfly event. Cinq-Mars also placed third in the B Final (11th overall) in the 50m backstroke, while Christian Payne won the B Final of the men's 50m backstroke to place ninth overall. His time in the B Final would have won him a bronze medal in the A Final. The women's 4x100m relay team of Sarty, Cinq-Mars, Reagan Crowell (Lakeville, NB) and Martine Nyhof (Mississauga, ON) earned an eighth place finish.

RESULTS
Finals 
4th - Isabel Sarty (200m Freestyle)
8th - Isabel Sarty, Lise Cinq-Mars, Reagan Crowell & Martine Nyhof (4x100m Freestyle Relay)
9th - Christian Payne (50m Backstroke)
11th - Lise Cinq-Mars (50m Breaststroke)
24th - Martine Nyhof (50m Backstroke)

Preliminaries
26th - Reagan Crowell (200m Freestyle)
30th - Abbey Corish (100m Breaststroke)
30th - Veronica Hollick (100m Butterfly)
36th - Lauren Mosher (100m Butterfly)
36th - Tyler Immel-Herron (200m Freestyle)


Full Day 1 Recap

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 

2020 U SPORTS Swimming Championships
Day 1: Multiple gold medalists highlight Thursday action

February 21, 2020 

VICTORIA (U SPORTS) – The UBC Thunderbirds continued their run of domination on the men's side, while Toronto Varsity Blues didn't win a gold medal, but lead the team standings in the women's division after Day 1 of the 2020 U SPORTS Swimming Championships at Saanich Commonwealth Place. 

Schedule

Livestream: CBCSports.ca 

UBC's Emily Overholt got the 'A' Finals underway when she defended her gold medal in the women's 200m freestyle with a time of 1:58.80, just shy of the U SPORTS record she set last year of 1:57.26. With two more races on the evening, her winning wasn't done there.

"I'm definitely happy with my times today at this point in the season. To improve on what I did last year is a good thing," said Overholt. "The (record) time was in the back of my mind for sure and this was a good setup for Olympic trials in a couple weeks."

The two-time national champion not only defended her gold in the 400m individual medley, but set a new U SPORTS record by nearly 2.5 seconds with her swim of 4:38.58. She capped off the evening with a gold in the 4x100m freestyle relay with a time of 3:45.42.

The host Victoria Vikes produced the first double-gold winner of the meet.

Danielle Hanus has medalled in the 50m backstroke and 100m butterfly at U SPORTS meets in the past, but never captured the double gold – until Thursday night. Hanus got rolling with a gold in the women's 50m back (28.05) and later added a gold in the 100m butterfly (58.74).

"It's pretty surreal right now. It's always fun racing at this meet and we have a great home pool advantage, getting to train here every day," said Hanus. "I'm pretty stoked for the rest of the weekend. We have a lot of swimmers dropping times and giving it their all out there."

Another long course U SPORTS record fell when Clément Secchi of McGill University defended his gold medal and set the new record in the 50m backstroke with a time of 25.82. Josh Dow of the Calgary Dinos previously set the record in February of 2016 with a time of 25.98.

"Winning for your team is what matters here," said Secchi. "I've been training only butterfly, so to get this result was great."

The McGill swimmer wasn't done there. Later, he picked up a gold in the men's 100m butterfly with a time of 53.55. At the end of the evening, he swam third in the bronze medal winning 4x100m freestyle relay.

Kelsey Wog of the Manitoba Bisons completed the U SPORTS grand slam by winning the women's 100m breaststroke for the fourth consecutive year with her time of 1:06.44. She missed setting a new U SPORTS record by 1/100^th of a second.

"It's nice to have records, but I was just focusing on my race here this evening," said Wog.

Another local swimmer, Josh Zakala of the Vikes, won gold. Two years ago, he captured silver in the men's 400m individual medley, but this time, he set a new U SPORTS record with a time of 4:21.80.

Earlier in the morning during the preliminary races, Wog set a new U SPORTS short track record in the 400m IM with her swim on 1:05.05.

Full Results

DAY 1 TEAM STANDINGS

Men (Nelson C. Hart Trophy) 

1. UBC, 360 points
2. Calgary, 272
3. McGill, 241
4. Toronto, 222.5
5. Victoria, 176
6. Regina, 163
7. Ottawa, 145
8. Montreal, 113
9. Alberta, 100
10. Laval, 83
11. Western, 58
12. Waterloo, 37
13. McMaster, 32
14. Acadia, 27
15. Dalhousie, 20
16. Manitoba, 17
17. Guelph, 16
18. Thompson Rivers, 6.5
19. Brock, 6
20. Lethbridge, 4

Women 

1. Toronto, 307
2. UBC, 304
3. Calgary, 281
4. Victoria, 213
5. Montreal, 201
6. Ottawa, 99
7. Western, 90
8. Dalhousie, 87
9. McMaster, 84.5
10. Manitoba, 83.5
11. Rouge et Or, 75
12. McGill, 72.5
13. Guelph, 41
14. Alberta, 31
15. Regina, 26
16. UNB, 25
17. Waterloo, 22.5
18. Laurentian, 22
19. Acadia, 21
20. Sherbrooke, 17
21. Wilfrid Laurier, 16
22. UQTR, 14
23. Lethbridge, 2

INDIVIDUAL MEDALLISTS 

M 200m Freestyle

1. Markus Thormeyer, UBC, 1:48.29
2. Davide Casarin, Ottawa, 1:48.94
3. Alexander Pratt, UBC, 1:51.11

M 50m Back

1. Clément Secchi, McGill, 25.82 U SPORTS record
2. Robert Hill, Calgary, 26.10
3. Thomas Lafontaine-Giguère, Montreal, 26.63

M 100m Breast

1. Jaren LeFran, UBC, 1:03.02
2. Graeme Aylward, Toronto, 1:03.21
3. Benjamin Blackmon, Calgary, 1:03.50

M 100m Fly

1. Clément Secchi, McGill, 53.55
2. Dmitriy Lim, UBC, 55.06
3. Osvald Nitski, Toronto, 55.23

M 400m IM

1. Josh Zakala, Victoria, 4:21.80 U SPORTS record
2. Brodie Young, UBC, 4:23.07
3. Brian Palaschuk, Regina, 4:23.60

M 4x100m Freestyle Relay

1. UBC, 3:24.33 (Alexander Pratt, Matthew Meuleman, Dmitriy Lim, Markus Thormeyer)

2. Toronto, 3:25.97 (Cameron Kidd, Bjoern-Ole Schrader, Gael Chaubet, Bernard Godolphin)

3. McGill, 3:27.42 (Will Simpson, Clément Secchi, Brandon Freiberger, Marius Collin)

W 200m Freestyle

1. Emily Overholt, UBC, 1:58.80
2. Danica Ludlow, Calgary, 2:00.02
3. Aleksa Gold, Toronto, 2:01.34

W 50m Back

1. Danielle Hanus, Victoria, 28.05
2. Daphne Danyluk, McGill, 28.99
3. Rachel Rode, Toronto, 28.99

W 100m Breast

1. Kelsey Wog, Manitoba, 1:06.44
2. Hillary Metcalfe, UBC, 1:10.59
3. Lauren Shearer, Ottawa, 1:10.75

W 100m Fly

1. Danielle Hanus, Victoria, 58.74
2. Hannah Genich, Toronto, 59.27
3. Anais Arlandis, Montreal, 1:01.52

W 400m IM

1. Emily Overholt, UBC, 4:38.58 U SPORTS record
2. Megan Dalke, UBC, 4:49.84
3. Allison McCloy, Calgary, 4:51.57

W 4x100m Freestyle Relay

1.  UBC, 3:45.42 (Hoi Lam Tam, Quincy Brozo, Mackenzie Gunther, Emily Overholt)

2. Toronto, 3:45.77 (Aleksa Gold, Georgia Kidd, Sarah Polley, Ainsley Murray)

3. Montreal, 3:50.12 (Charlotte Beauchemin, Marie-Lou Lapointe, Anais Arlandis, Frederique Cigna)