Claus-Udarbe Picks Up Top-5 Mark, Huston and Yoo Earn Race Wins

Wednesday, December 18

Las Vegas, NV

Prelims: 9:30 A.M. / Finals: 5:00 P.M.

UNLV Invitational

Photo by: Owen Roberts

Claus-Udarbe Picks Up Top-5 Mark, Huston and Yoo Earn Race Wins

12/18/2024 10:00:00 PM | Swimming and Diving

SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. — Cal Poly finished the UNLV Finis Invitational with a bang, led by Amalie Claus-Udarbe swimming a program top-5 time for the second day in a row as well as Drew Huston and Evan Yoo pacing one event each for individual race wins.

Olivia Sundgren placed 6th in the Women's 1650 Freestyle (17:11.00) under ten seconds away from her own fifth-best mark in program history. Cameron Schwantes secured 11th on the men's side (16:15.00).

Kristin Der (2:06.74), Mikaela Gomez (2:07.52), and Kayla Wieckowski (2:08.13) all qualified for the finals of the 200 Back, placing 20th, 23rd, and 24th respectively in the prelims. Der cut her time to 2:05.26 in finishing 19th.

Drew Huston (1:47.39) secured yet another A-Final spot with his 200 Back (1:47.39) with Lucas Meneghetti (1:49.60), Scott Iannaccone (1:51.36), and Yuki Hayashi (1:51.59) all making finals as well. Huston slashed his time in winning the 200 Back (1:43.44), one of Cal Poly's two race wins on Saturday.

Courtney Cross swam a 32nd place time (52.75) in the 100 Free to qualify, but Ella Bettencourt (52.52) and Summer Cheng (52.57) topped that time in the D-Final.

Nick Elliott was a little over one-half second (44.97) from breaking the program top-5 list with his own qualifying freestyle.

Jonathan Butler (45.05), Lucas Crother-Collado (45.35), Evan O-Connell (45.91), Finn Schlamp (46.17), Drew Arney (46.36), Lucas Meneghetti (46.49), and Jaxon Bruzgul (46.84) placed within the top-32 on the men's side alongside Elliott to reach a final. Butler swam 44.83 in picking up a B-Final win and 9th place overall.

After swimming a top-5 program time in yesterday's 100 Breast, Amalie Claus-Udarbe once again etched her name among Cal Poly's best female swimmers with her 200 Breast performance (2:18.17) during the prelims, good for fifth-best in program history.

Rhian Neitzel (2:19.93), Madreena Lee (2:23.23), and Melia Costa (2:24.22) swam good enough times to qualify behind Claus-Udarbe.

Another individual race win came with Evan Yoo's 200 Breast, first topping the prelims (1:55.86) by almost 1.5 seconds faster than the next closest swimmer before cutting his time down to 1:54.38, just .28 seconds away from matching his program-high mark.

Alex Seybold, the current second-fastest in that top-5 list, finished 3rd in the 200 Breast (1:58.88), while Krishna Clarke (2:03.29), Alex Power (2:04.46), Camilo Vargas (2:04.50), and Trevor Yargeau (2:05.15) finished top-20 in the prelims to qualify. Vargas improved to 2:02.38 and Power to 2:02.44 during the finals.

Two women, Taylor Lyon (2.07.33) and Kayla Wieckowski (2:08.89), got out of the 200 Fly prelims and finished in the top-24 places, while Will Newlands (1:51.12) swam a new personal-best 200 Fly prelims in leading the men (8th place), backed by Alex Seybold (1:52.20), Anthony Moskalenko (1:53.10), Austin Lathrop (1:54.64), and Cole Groom (1:54.82) who qualified.

Rounding out the day and invitational as a whole was the 400 Free Relay. Cal Poly's top women's team of Mikaela Gomez, Courtney Cross, Ella Bettencourt, and Summer Chang swam to a 12th place finish (3:29.36).

For the men's relay, Nick Elliott, Evan Yoo, Evan O'Connell, and Drew Huston (3:00.38) finished 6th with Finn Schlamp, Lucas Meneghetti, Jaxon Bruzgul, and Lucas Crother-Collado just two places behind.