ATLANTA -- Junior sprinter Brett Allen competed in the 50-yard freestyle Thursday at the NCAA Division I Men's Swimming and Diving Nationals, held at the Georgia Tech Aquatic Center earning All-American honors.

Allen set a new Mountain West Conference record for the 50 free in the preliminary race finishing in 19.62 while earning second-team All-American honors, finishing 12th overall at finals.

"Brett did a fantastic job and I am very proud of him," said Coach Tim Powers.

In the morning at prelims, Allen swam the 50 faster than he ever has in 19.62, finishing 16th overall, barely making the top-16 cut-off for finals. Later that night in the fastest event, Allen placed 12th at finals, bringing home five points for his Cougars.

Allen finished .59 seconds behind the winner of the event, Cullen Jones of North Carolina State, clocking in at 19.18, a new Georgia Tech Pool record.

This is Allen's first time at a National Meet and his first NCAA All-American award.

Allen will swim the 100-yard freestyle at Saturday morning's prelims, hoping to make the 7 p.m. finals.

PROVO -- Junior Brett Allen of the BYU men's swim team heads to Atlanta, Georgia for NCAA National Championships this week to represent his Cougars in the 50 and 100 free.

"Brett is undefeated in the 50 free on the year," said Coach Tim Powers. "There are ten guys only a tenth of a second in front of him and ten guys a tenth of a second behind him, he has as good of shot as anybody."

Allen is tied for 15th in the nation in the 50-yard free with a time of 19.69, which he achieved in finals at the Mountain West Conference Championships at the end of last month. He is also swimming the 100-yard free at the NCAA's, in which he is ranked 27th in the nation with a time of 43.84.

"This is the hardest meet in the world and there is no room for error," Powers said. "It is an exciting meet, it is a fast meet and it is a fun meet."

Powers has taken at least one swimmer to the NCAA National Championships all of his 31 seasons as the men's head coach.

This week's meet has the fastest swimmers in the world; even faster times are achieved at this meet than at the Olympics because 40-percent of the swimmers are foreign. Last year, nine world records were achieved, while at the last Summer Olympics only four were set.

Junior Jorge Azevedo missed going to NCAA's by eight-one-hundredths of a second in the 100-yard fly with his MWC Championship second-place time of 48.45.

Check www.byucougars.com/swimming_diving/ to see how Allen does this week at NCAA's, or go to Georgia Tech Athletics homepage for day-by-day results at:

http://ramblinwreck.collegesports.com/sports/c-swim/spec-rel/2006-m-swim-ncaa.html