Wyoming Mourns The Death Of Three Student Athletes In Car Crash

Courtesy of Clair McFarland/Cowboy State Daily

LARAMIE — Standing 6-foot-6 and sporting an effortless grin, Charlie Clark feared no strangers.

“Hi, I’m Charlie Clark, who are you?” said the young man spontaneously to his coach’s wife one day.

For University of Wyoming head coach Dave Denniston, of the swimming and diving program, it was a first. Never in nine years had a student athlete walked up to his wife “out of the blue” and introduced himself, he said.

But that’s how Clark was, Denniston told the mourners at Clark’s UW memorial service Wednesday.

“Strangers were just friends that he hadn’t met yet,” said Denniston, who allowed himself a chuckle as he related a similar memory Clark’s mother had shared with him before the service.

He also recalled how Clark had set out one Sunday, with only three other people in the pool, to set the pool record in the 400 individual medley. Clark came out wearing a racing suit.

The coach said he humored the young swimmer. “OK Charlie, let’s try it,” he said.

Clark shattered the pool record by 5 seconds — “On a Sunday. Randomly.”

Clark, along with UW teammates Carson Muir and Luke Slabber died Feb. 22 in a one-vehicle rollover on Highway 287, about 5 miles south of the border Wyoming shares with Colorado. Clark was 18, Muir 18 and Slabber 21.