VANCOUVER - Sunday marked both the final day of the 2016 Odlum Brown Limited Colleges Cup, and the last day of competition at UBC's historic old Aquatic Centre. A dominant, first-place performance from the Thunderbirds provided the perfect conclusion to a storied building. UBC swimmers set an astounding 22 meet records over the weekend.
See the full list of results and records form the Odlum Brown Colleges Cup here.
The Thunderbirds recorded 1,601 points over the weekend, thanks to record-breaking performances from both the men's and women's teams. The Lower-Mainland Regional All-Stars, comprised of the region's best high-school swimmers and coached by ex-Thunderbird Assistant Coach Brian Johns finished in second with 1,073 points. Rounding out the top three was the University of Alberta with 945 points.
UBC head coach
Steve Price was happy with his teams' performances throughout the weekend, and feels they are well prepared for the upcoming championships.
"The [weekend] went really well. They've positioned themselves well going into the Canada West Championships, and the team is looking pretty good," he said.
Price noted that the teams' ability to set multiple meet records is a prime examples of how mentally and physically prepared they were for the meet.
"We had standout swimmers like
Ingrid Wilm, who was great all the way on the backstroke.
Erika Seltenreich-Hodgson swam great, and [Markus] Thormeyer had an amazing night. We had standouts throughout."
UBC's
Markus Thormeyer had a night to remember, crushing a pair of meet records. First, he dominated the men's 200 freestyle with a 1:45.67 finish, breaking the previous record set in 2001 by UBC's Mark Johnson. Just four races later he broke another meet record, swimming the 200 backstroke in 1:56.21.
Thormeyer wasn't the only T-Bird to walk away with multiple records.
Ingrid Wilm set two meet records with her 2:09.79 finish in the women's 200 backstroke and a 27.78 finish in the 50 backstroke. The latter was only 1.1 seconds shy of the Canadian record.
Other notable Thunderbird performances included
Coleman Allen's 53.79 meet record in the men's 100 butterfly, and
Hau-Li Fan's narrow win in the men's 1500 freestyle.
Price was honored to finish off the Thunderbirds' career in the old Aquatic Centre with such a remarkable performance.
"I told the teams these are the last chances to break the records in your own pool. Those records will be the last ones in this pool. We're excited to head to the new pool, but people can't forget by looking around at the Championship banners and Olympic berths that we've produced a lot of good performances in this facility," he said.
