Multiple UK alumnae earn medals in Sunday’s Olympic competition

TOKYO (AP/UK Public Relations/WTVQ) — More and more former University of Kentucky athletes are displaying their talents for the world at the Tokyo Olympics.

UK alum Jasmine Camacho-Quinn of Puerto Rico powered ahead of American Keni Harrison, another UK alum, in the women’s 100-meter hurdles Monday, springing an upset and keeping the United States out of the win column at the Olympic track meet for yet another session.

Camacho-Quinn finished in 12.37 seconds for a .15 second win — a blowout in such a short race — over the world-record holder, Harrison. Harrison finished in 12.52 seconds. Jamaica’s Megan Tapper finished third.

Puerto Rico, a U.S. territory that competes under its own flag at the Olympics, has one more track gold medal than the deepest team at the Games as the meet approaches its halfway point.

Camacho-Quinn’s best time coming into the Olympics was 12.38. She ran a 12.26 in the semifinals that ranks fourth on the all-time list.

Additionally, UK College of Medicine student Gerek Meinhardt will bring home his second bronze medal as part of Team USA in the men’s team foil competition at the delayed 2020 Olympics. The team defeated Japan 45-31. Meinhardt previously won a bronze medal in the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Games.

UK medical student Gerek Meinhardt has won his second bronze medal in men’s team foil in Tokyo.
(Source: University of Kentucky)

Team USA’s starting lineup for the day included 2016 Olympic individual silver medalist Alex Massialas, of San Francisco, California, who competed in college at Stanford University; six-time Senior World medalist Gerek Meinhardt, a native of San Francisco, who competed for Notre Dame University; and 2018 Junior World Champion Nick Itkin, of Los Angeles, California, who also competed for Notre Dame. Race Imboden, of Brooklyn, New York, a 2019 Senior World Team Champion with Massialas and Meinhardt, was subbed in during the second rotation.

Meinhardt, like Massialas, trained with the Massialas Foundation.

Massialas, Meinhardt and Imboden won bronze together in 2016 with Itkin competing at his first Games this year.

Team USA defeated Germany, 45-36, in the quarter-finals, but lost to the Russian Olympic Committee, 45-41.

The bronze medal win by Team USA marks the second Olympic medal in the men’s team foil event for the United States since 1932.

Meinhardt earned his bachelor’s degree from Notre Dame, where he met his wife, fellow UK medical student Lee Kiefer, the gold medal winner in women’s individual foil.