JACKSONVILLE, IL – The Principia Men's swimming team headed to Illinois College for their final dual meet of the season. While the men lost the meet, 67 – 104, they showed continued improvements as they taper for their final meet of the season.
Key highlights for the men included three event wins and a freshman showing continued improvements. Freshman
Garrett Barner earned the first win of the meet for the men in the 200 Free in a closely contested race. He pulled away in the last 25 yards to win in 2:00.73. The very next events saw another win for the men as junior captain
Hunter Mehring easily defeated the field in the 50 Free. In the same event freshman
Andrew Boyd went a 24.67, good for third place on the day, but also a season best time and another significant drop in time.
The 100 Free saw another season best. Mehring took a very close second place in 50.62 which is a season best time for him. Boyd then earned a season best in the 100 back, dropping another 2 seconds of time to go 1:03.16. He has now dropped 2 seconds in this event in each of the last 3 meets!
The final win for the men came from Mehring as he won the 100 breast in 1:03.00.
While the men lost the meet, many of their swims were just off best times and how they were swimming their races showed much improvement.
The team will be off next week as they continue their taper into the final meet of the season. They will host the Liberal Arts Championships starting Wednesday, Feb 10 through Saturday, Feb 13. Morning sessions on Thursday through Saturday are at 10 am, while evening sessions every night start at 6 pm.
