Eight Cougars Finish with All-America Honors on Day One of Nationals

NAMPA, Idaho - Eight BYU athletes earned All-America honors while three advanced to final races on day one of the 2012 NCAA Division I Indoor Championships on Friday. 

The men's distance medley relay team of Miles Batty, Ryan Waite, Cade Lindahl and Rex Shields finished third in 9:36.07. BYU trailed throughout the race but Batty had an amazing finish and passed four different schools to pull BYU into the top three. 

Batty also competed in the mile preliminaries. Looking to defend his national championships, he finished first in his heat and first overall with a time of 4:03.85, setting a new facility record. He will compete in the finals tomorrow at 6:15 p.m. MST. 

The women's DMR team of Lacey Bleazard, Sarah Edwards, Nachelle Mackie and Katie Palmer also had an impressive race, finishing sixth overall in 11:09.81.

Palmer and Mackie qualified for the finals in the 800m, with Palmer finishing first in her heat and first overall with a time 2:04.42, another facility record. Mackie came in fifth in the preliminaries with a qualifying time of 2:05.16. They will both compete in the 800m finals tomorrow at 7:45 p.m. MST.

In BYU's only field event of the day, Victor Weirich represented BYU in the pole vault finals and finished 10th with a height of 5.30m (17' 4.5").

Lindahl and Waite also competed in the 400m and the 800m and finished with times of 46.99 and 1:49.61, respectively.  Unfortunately, neither qualified for the final heat in their respective events. 

Tomorrow, not only will Batty be competing in the mile and Palmer and Mackie in the 800m finals, but Christen Guenther will also compete in the women's pole vault finals at 5 p.m. MST.  All events will be streamed on ESPN3.