CHARLOTTE, N.C.- The Gardner-Webb women's swim team looked impressive on the first day of the three-day Fall Frenzy Inviational finishing the day in second place, while the men's swim team currently holds the fifth spot.
The Fall Frenzy Inviational, hosted by Wingate University, is used as a pre Coastal Collegiate Swimming Association Championship (CCSA) event. The format used this weekend (prelims/finals), will be the same format used in February's CCSA Championship meet in Athens, Ga.
The Runnin' Bulldogs got off to a fast start in the first women's event of the meet, the 200 free relay, finishing the event in second place. Gardner-Webb and Queens were extremely close the entire event, but Queens finished just 0.24 seconds ahead of the Runnin' Bulldogs for first place.
At the conclusion of the women's 200 free relay, it was the men's 200 free relay, and Gardner-Webb finished the relay in eighth place with a time of 1:24.39, which was three seconds better than its seed time.
Madi Dinsmore was the lone swimmer for GWU entered into the 500 free, finishing the event in 21st place (5:12.60).
Following Dinsmore in the 500 free, Mason Hutchinson and Luke Denman competed for the Runnin' Bulldogs in the men's 500 free, finishing the 20 lap event in 4th (4:37.03) and 10th place (4:40.09) respectively.
The third women's event of the meet, the 200 IM saw the Runnin' Bulldogs place four swimmers in the top eight spots. Lili Tóth was the highest finisher for GWU, finishing in fourth place and was followed by London Schumacher, Adel Kiss, and Charity Byrum, who finished in 5th, 6th, and 7th respectively.
Following the women's 200 IM, the men competed in the same event. Nathan Lile was the highest finisher for Gardner-Webb, placing ninth with a time of 1:51.67.
The shortest event of the meet, the 50 free was contested after the 200 IM and in the women's event, Mary O'Doherty paced Gardner-Webb with a fifth place finish, and on the men's side it was Connor Bos finishing as the top swimmer for the Runnin' Bulldogs in 15th place.
The final two events of the evening were the men's and women's 400 medley relay, and Gardner-Webb finished the night out strong with a second place finish in the women's event (3:47.17), which was just 0.17 seconds off the pool record, which was set back in 2003.
The Fall Frenzy continues tomorrow morning with Preliminaries beginning at 10 am and finals starting at 6 pm. The three-day event will conclude on Sunday.
