Marco Conati
Marco Conati swims the butterfly leg of the 200 medley relay in one of two pool records he set on Friday.

CMS Men's Swimming and Diving Holds Six-Point Lead after First Day of Pomona-Pitzer Dual

CLAREMONT, Calif. - Junior Marco Conati set a Haldeman Pool record in the 50 free to help the Claremont-Mudd-Scripps men's swimming and diving team to a 58-52 lead over Pomona-Pitzer after the first day of a two-day dual meet between the Sixth Street Rivals on Friday.

Conati and fellow junior Andreas Roeseler actually both broke the facility record, with Conati edging out his teammate 20.79 to 20.82 to pass the old pool mark of 20.86, set two years ago by Lukas Menkoff.

In addition, Conati and Roeseler swam the butterfly and freestyle legs, respectively, to help CMS start the meet with a win in the 400 medley relay in 3:18.16, which set another facility record. First-year Anderson Breazeale started that relay off with the backstroke, while sophomore Walter Limm swam the breaststroke leg. 

Senior Ben Culberson then came in a close second in the 500 free in 4:33.28, just behind the 4:32.25 of Paddy Baylis of Pomona-Pitzer as both eclipsed the old pool mark. Senior Sam Willett was also a close second in the 200 IM in 1:51.66 to Jason Lu of Pomona-Pitzer (1:50.92), also with both passing the old pool record. 

CMS finished second and third in the 200 freestyle relay in the final swimming event of the day, as the Stags team of Anderson Breazeale, Thayer Breazeale, Willett and first-year Nathan Luis finished in 1:24.50, less than one second behind the Sagehens "A" team. 

In the diving end of the pool, the men competed in the three-meter and senior Kendall Hollimon broke his own Haldeman Pool record with a final score of 363.76, passing his previous facility mark by over 41 points. 

The second day of the two-day meet will take place tomorrow, starting at 11 a.m., as individual events will include the 100 and 200 in the freestyle, butterfly, breaststroke and backstroke, along with the 400 IM, the 1650, and the one-meter dive.