NAAA president Ephraime Serrette is happy with the performances of T&T’s athletes at the Jamaica International Invitational meet on Saturday night. World Championships bronze medallist Kelly-Ann Baptiste led the way with an amazing 10.86 seconds taking second place in the women’s 100m. Cleopatra Borel (18.69 women’s shot put), Jehue Gordon (48.98 men’s 400m hurdles), Renny Quow (45.48 men’s 400m) and Ayanna Alexander (13.69 women’s triple jump) also finished second in their events. “The athletes who participated all gave a good account of themselves. With these kind of performances, we can only look forward to greater things later in the season leading up to the Olympics,” Serrette commented.
Serrette also praised the relay teams who competed at the Penn Relays in Pennsylvania, USA one week earlier,
“Based on the athletes available for the meet, I was happy with the performances of the teams, especially the men 4x400 team which comprised two junior athletes and producing a 3:04 (to finish sixth). That was good. With the likes of Deon Lendore, Renny Quow, Ade Alleyne Forte and Zwede Hewitt we should have a good team.” The president added that Semoy Hackett and Kai Selvon were able to compete for their universities as well as the national women’s 4x100m, which finished fourth in 44.07, after the NAAA spoke with their coaches.
“We had discussions with both coaches indicating the importance for the female team to re-establish times to get into the top 16.” Serrette added both Baptiste and Quow indicated unavailability for the meet very early. The former national sprinter said that the NAAA has plans for the teams to compete in other relay meets. “The Penn Relays was the first of many relays which we have scheduled for our teams. We are now preparing for teams to compete at meets in Venezuela, St Kitts, Puerto Rico, Guadeloupe and Bahamas,” he said.
Source: www.guardian.co.tt
By Clayton Clarke