The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

WITH some key injuries to some of the athletes, Rupert Gardiner said the coaching staff for Team Bahamas did the best they could in assembling the line-ups for the inaugural IAAF World Relays Bahamas.

The 24-member team collected a total of 15 points for eighth place in the standings. The United States carted off the Golden Baton title with 60 points, well ahead of Jamaica with 41 for second. Kenya got third with 35.

Team Bahamas got disqualified in the men’s 4 x 100m, but the 4 x 200m team ran one minute and 23.19 seconds for sixth place after qualifying with a national record of 1:22.10 and the 4 x 400m team was second in a season’s best 2:57.59 to trail the United States, who ended up with the world leading championship record time of 2:57.25.

On the women’s side, the 4 x 100m team got second in the B final in a season’s best of 43.46, while the 4 x 200m team finished just outside of a medal in fourth in a national record feat of 1:31.31 and the 4 x 400m team was second in a season’s best of 3:31.74.

“I was pleased with the Bahamian public and I’m happy about Team Bahamas,” said Gardiner, who was assisted by coaches Fritz Grant, Roger Charlton and Cherish Hollinsworth. “I think Team Bahamas performed exceptionally well.”

Of course, Team Bahamas was hit by a series of injuries before and during the relays, but Gardiner said the coaching staff worked with what they had left in the camp.

“Before the relays, Jamial Rolle and Warren Fraser went down with injuries and they could not compete,” Gardiner said. “We all know that there were some collegiate athletes who couldn’t compete because they have nationals this weekend. That’s why you didn’t see Shavez Hart and Trevorvano Mackey.”

With the athletes available, Gardiner said they ensured that they were doubled up wherever it was necessary to compete in more than one event, in some cases outside of their signature events.

One of the athletes missed the most was quarter-miler Ramon Miller, who slipped and suffered an ankle injury in the call room and was not available to run in the final of the men’s 4 x 400m final.

“His ankle was sallow. That was why he couldn’t go,” said Gardiner of Miller, who was replaced by LaToy Williams.

Together with Demetrius Pinder, Chris ‘Fireman’ Brown and Michael Mathieu, Williams helped the Bahamas to finish as runners-up to the United States, anchored by LaShawn Merritt, in the final in the marquee event of the meet.

Despite the fact that there were some injuries and even national record holder Derrick Atkins wasn’t able to suit up, even though he was in the stands as a Bahamian ambassador, Griffith said the men’s sprint team did the best that they could.

What they didn’t anticipate was the disqualification in the men’s 4 x 100m final. Griffith attributed it to the fact that he and team-mates Johnathan Farquharson, Stephen ‘Dirty’ Newbold and Blake Bartlett didn’t have sufficient time to prepare in practice.

“The performances was good. I wouldn’t say it was great for the entire team,” Griffith noted. “We had some problems with the men’s 4 x 1. I think the preparation could have been better for us. This is the World Relays and we should have been prepared for it.

“I think we could have performed much better. We hope to make up for it the next meet coming up.”

The next major competition for Team Bahamas will be the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, Scotland, at the end of July.

In defense of the coaching staff, Gardiner said coming into the camp, they didn’t have sufficient time to get everybody together.

“Two weeks before the Relays, we were supposed to have a training camp in Freeport, but the money wasn’t available,” he pointed out. “So we got them here in Nassau, but when you don’t have your top sprinters, it makes it difficult to prepare.”

To compensate for the disqualification in the 4 x 1, the team of Bartlett, Griffith, Wesley Neymour and Andretti Bain got sixth in the 4 x 200m final. The same time, however, made the headlines when they posted a national record of 1:22.18 in the preliminaries.

For Bain, who like Neymour were 4 x 400 specialists, said he felt great running at home in a global event, especially considering that he was one of the oldest members of the team.

“I know I enjoyed it and all of the members of Team Bahamas enjoyed it,” he quipped. “I cab’t wait for the next one. This was a successful meet. Speaking to other athletes, guests who came in for it, the IAAF, it was a successful meet.

“The crowd support was second to none, especially having the junkanoo music in the background. I think personally, it kind of liven up the distance races. So it was awesome.”

With all of the injuries that he had to deal with over the last few years, Bain said he wasn’t sure that he would be ready to compete in the meet, but he’s slowly working his way back for the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

The women’s 4 x 100m relay team of Sheniqua ‘Q’ Ferguson, Cache Armbrister and Anthonique Strachan missed making it to the A final, but they ended up turning in a second place finish in the B final.

And the 4 x 200m team of Ferguson, Strachan, Nivea Smith and Armbrister sped to a fourth place time of 1:31.31 for a national record.

Strachan, speaking on behalf of her team-mates, said she felt the teams performed very well under the circumstances they competed under, not having the service of Shaunae Miller, who withdraw with a nagging hamstring injury just before the start of the competition.

“At the end of the day, the team put 110 percent into it,” Stracham stressed. “We did what we had to do and we worked with who we had. There was nothing more that we could do with what we had to work with.

“Nothing really surprising happened in the 4 x 1 because we all knew each other and because the 4 x 1 is so technical, if you make a hiccup, it take you a while to recover from that hiccup. It’s either you get it around all at one time or it will not happen.”

The women’s 4 x 4 team of Lanece Clarke, Shekeitha Henfield, Christine Amertil and Myriam Byfield experienced the worse nightmare when Henfield dropped her baton coming off the final bend in the pack on the second leg.

The misfortune caused the Bahamas from advancing to the final. The same quartet had to settle for the B final where they clocked a season’s best of 3:31.71.

Team Bahamas didn’t have any participation in the men and women 4 x 800 and 4 x 1,500 metres, which prevented the team from moving any further up the ladder in the final standings.