BYU continues to improve at Day 2 of Texas Invite

Texas Invite Results-Day 2

AUSTIN, Texas – Jake Taylor broke a school record as BYU continued a strong showing on the second day of the Texas Invitational Thursday at the Lee and Joe Jamail Texas Swimming Center.

“We had a great day with some really impressive times from so many members of our team,” BYU head coach John Brooks said. “It was great to see a large group of our swimmers get season-best times, and we were very close to breaking some school records. Seeing some of our returned missionaries come back and get close to lifetime-bests was also really fun to watch.”

Among a large group of BYU swimmers to set season and lifetime-bests were Alexandria Sorensen, Lauren Shaw Taylor, Ellie Thornbrue, Payton Sorenson and Jake Taylor who all contributed to a strong finish on the day. Jake Taylor broke a school record in the morning preliminaries of the 200-yard individual medley (1:44.27), and then rebroke that record in the finals later in the evening (1:43.50).

The preliminaries on Thursday morning featured qualifying events for the 500-yard free, 200 individual medley and 50 free finals. In the 500 free, Thornbrue, Lauren Shaw Taylor, Shawn Western and Luis Ventura all advanced. Riley Merrill, Preston Jenkins, Stephen Richards and Jake Taylor timed well enough to advance to the final event in the 200 IM, and Katie Smith, Sorensen, Harrison Strange, Nathan Henderson, Kent Fellows, Ryan Sorensen and Connor Stirling all went on to the final in the 50 free.

In the first event of the evening, a BYU team of Alora Foliaki, Sorensen, Smith and Taylor finished the women’s 200 free relay in 1:34.14, good enough for 12th place. On the men’s side, Sorenson, Stirling, Jenkins and Taylor raced to a 1:19.04 for second place. Sorenson impressively split a sub :20 leading off the relay.

Taylor was the top finisher for BYU in the women’s 500 free with a 4:53.43 for 21st place. In the men’s event, Ventura swam to a 4:26.55 finish for BYU to place 18th.

In the men’s 200 IM, Taylor took second place for the Cougars with a final time of 1:43.50.

Sorensen was the top performer for BYU in the women’s 50 free, clocking a 23.33 for 16th in the event. Stirling had the best finish for the Cougars in the men’s event, sprinting to a 20.07 finish for ninth.

A BYU team comprised of Taylor, Richards, Rainer Ng and Sorenson wrapped the day with a fifth-place finish in the men’s 400 medley relay, finishing in 3:12.78.

The Texas Invite will pick back up Friday with the timed trials beginning at 9 a.m. CST, followed by the event finals at 6 p.m. CST. Fans can follow the meet on the live results page and complete results will be posted on the website at the conclusion of the day’s events.