help with date conversion

[surfengine]

I have a cells with this data:

1/22/2011 8:10:11 AM

I want to use it as a vlookup point but its failing becuase the time is added.
How can reliably get rid of the time data? I tried using search to locate the space and then use a LEFT to get the date data but that didnt work out so well.

[surfengine]

nevermind, I figured it out. it wasnt converting to a number so I had to do the =1*cell to get it to work.

duh