Athens, Ga. – The University of Florida men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams sent seven athletes to the Bulldog Invite, a last chance meet held on the University of Georgia campus.  The Gators came away with seven provisional times following day one of the meet.

The third ranked women sent five athletes to the meet, led by Kristen Beales who tallied the first two provisional times for the Gators with a swim of 4:48.48 in the 500 freestyle final.  Beales fell nearly two seconds shy of her preliminary time of 4:46.98, also a provisional qualifying time.  Freshman Stacy Nedrud earned a provisional cut in both the preliminaries and finals of the 200-yard IM with a swim of 2:03.11 in the finals, .20 seconds better than her morning swim.  Nedrud also touched in with a time of 2:06.20 in a time trial of the 200 individual medley.

Jenne Ballatore garnered two provisional times in the 200 freestyle, touching the wall with a time of 1:48.87 in the preliminaries and following with a time of 1:49.77 during the evening finals.  Sarah Peterson tallied two provisional times of 54.52 in the final and 54.98 in the preliminaries of the 100-yard backstroke.  Freshman Sarah Sykes wrapped up the evening for the Gators, touching in with a provisional time of 1:59.91 in the 200-yard butterfly time trial.  Sykes also turned in a time of 2:02.63 in the preliminaries of the 200 free.

For the men, Matthew Norton clocked in with a time of 1:38.09 in the 200 yard freestyle, a time that was just .01 better than his morning swim.  Senior Kyle Deery was just shy of a provisional time as well, touching the wall with his best swim during the morning session of 56.10.  He followed with a time of 57.02 in the final.

The Last Chance meet will conclude tomorrow as swimmers look to punch their ticket to either Columbus, Ohio (women) or Federal Way, Washington (men) for the NCAA Swimming and Diving Championships.