A couple of Louisville Cardinals have their sights set on pool and school records coming out of day 2 prelims from the Louisville Invite.
The Cards already hold substantial team leads in both genders, and should be in great shape to add to those margins Saturday night. The men lead by over 400 and hold top seeds in 3 of 5 Saturday races. The women are only up 75 on Western Kentucky, and also lead 3 races out of prelims.
Tanja Kylliainen pulled another tough double and will be in the hunt for two high finishes tonight. The Finnish wrecking ball tore through the 400 IM field with ease, putting up a season-best 4:08.19. She leads the field into finals by a whopping seven seconds, and very well could have more in the tank. She led the NCAA in 400 IM times prior to this weekend, but will need to find some more speed to reclaim that title – she’s been passed up by Texas A&M’s Sarah Henry (4:04.92) and Minnesota’s Brooke Zeiger (4:06.63) already this weekend.
Kylliainen is the second qualifier in the 100 fly, just one event after the 400 IM. Her 53.39 is second to teammate Kelsi Worrell (52.41). If Kylliainen chooses to swim both tonight, she’ll have only the men’s 400 IM in between to recover.
Worrell likely cruised that race and should have more in the tank should she really get after it tonight, considering she was 52.12 over a month ago at the SMU Classic. She’s locked in a cross-country battle with Kentucky’s Tina Bechtel, who went 51.44 this morning in Ohio State, for the top spot in the nation. Also in the hunt at the moment is Missouri’s Dani Barbiea, who went 51.51 at her home invite.
Worrell and Kylliainen’s Louisville teammate Pedro Coutinho took the top spot in the men’s 100 fly, nearly breaking his own pool and school records in the process. Coutinho went 46.64, which should give him a shot at the nation’s top spot, pending other meet results from this weekend. He’s just .02 off the pool record and .06 off his own school record.
Another close shave with a pool record came in the men’s 100 back, where senior Aaron Young went 47.47. He’s just about half a second off the pool record there.
The Western Kentucky women will do their best to run down Louisville tonight, and they hold the top seeds in the final two swimming events. Claire Conlon leads the 100 breast (1:02.80) and Nadine Lemmler leads a 1-2 in the 100 back (54.27) along with Allie Duff (54.69).
Finals begin at 6pm ET. You can find live results here.