SEATTLE, Wash. - In the first day of competition at the 2012 MPSF Indoor Championships, the men's track and field team ended the day in second with 19 points.

The distance medley relay team of Rex Shields, Shaquille Walker, Ryan Waite and Miles Batty stole the night, winning the event with a time of 9:29.00, setting a new BYU record, recording the No. 1 time in the NCAA and automatically qualifying for nationals.

In the 5000m, Alden Bahr finished second with a time of 13:51.68 and Jared Ward came in eighth, finishing in 13:57.55.

Victor Weirich and Braydon Bringhurst also added points for the Cougars in the pole vault with Weirich tying for fourth, jumping 5.23m (17-01.75), and Bringhurst tying for fifth with a height of 5.08m (16-08.00).

Competition will continue tomorrow with the men’s heptathlon 60m hurdles, which begins on 10:30 a.m., and finish with the women’s 4x400m relay at 2:40 p.m. 

PROVO, Utah - The BYU men's track team heads to Washington for the third time this season to participate in the program's first ever Mountain Pacific Sports Federation Championships on Friday and Saturday at the University of Washington's Demsey Indoor Facility. 

In its 20th year of competition, the MPSF Championships will have 12 teams competing on the men's side, including teams from the Pac-12, Big West and West Coast Conferences. Colorado also joins BYU in its first year of compeition.  

The No. 16 Cougars will be joined by four other nationally ranked schools, including Arizona and Arizona State, who enter the meet sixth and seventh in the nation, respectively, while Stanford comes in at 12th and Oregon at 19th.  

This meet is a very important one as it is the last chance for the athletes to qualify for the 2012 NCAA Indoor National Championships, which will be held in two weeks in Nampa, Idaho.

BYU currently has two competitors who have already qualified for nationals.  Victor Weirch qualified at the Blue and Orange Opener in the pole vault when he cleared 5.50m (18' 0.5"), a height that still has him tied for fourth nationally.  Miles Batty qualified in the mile at the 2012 Millrose Games when he broke the NCAA indoor mile record by nearly half a second, with an impressive time of 3:54.54.

Many other Cougars hope to join these two this weekend. After winning nine straight indoor conference titles in the Mountain West, the Cougars look to defeat reigning champions, Stanford, and leave their mark at their first MPSF championships.

This will be the 10th consecutive season in which the championships will be held in Washington. Competition begins on Friday at 12:30 p.m. PST with the men’s weight throw and concludes at 7:15 p.m. with the women’s pentathlon 800m run. The first event Saturday is the men’s heptathlon 60m hurdles, which begins on 10:30 a.m. The meet will conclude with the women’s 4x400m relay at 2:40 p.m.