The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

WHEN the Chris Brown Bahamas Invitational (CBBI) returns for its second version on April 16 at the Thomas A Robinson National Stadium, one of the marquee events will be the men’s triple jump, featuring Bahamian national record holder Leevan ‘Superman’ Sands.

Sands, 34, will pick up on the second part of his ‘Road to Recovery’ as he continues his rebound from near career-ending surgery after he suffered an injury at the last Olympic Games in London, England, when he makes a splash in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in August.

Last year, Sands began his trek back by winning the silver medal at the Pan American Games in Canada, qualifying for Rio with a season’s best of 16.99m (55ft 9in) before he went to the IAAF World Championships in Beijing, China, where he qualified for the final and finished tenth spot with 16.68m (54ft 8 3/4in).

At the CBBI, Brown is expected to be matched against Christian Taylor and Will Clay of the United States. Taylor, the 25-year-old Olympic and World champion, has a personal best of 18.21m (59ft 8 3/4in), which ranks second on the all-time list, while Clay, 24, was the silver medallist in the triple jump and bronze medallist in the long jump at the London Olympics. Clay has a personal best of 17.75m (58ft 3in).

“I know the atmosphere is going to be good. I know that the Bahamian people are going to come out and support it,” said Sands, who fed off the Bahamian crowd at the Bahamas Association of Athletic Associations’ National Championships in June to qualify for the Pan Am Games.

“I like competition, so it doesn’t matter to me. I’m just going to come home and have some fun and get the crowd into it. I just want to just try to get the best season opener that I’ve ever had. There’s no pressure or stress. I know I just have to be ready. Once I get the crowd going, I’m going to do what I do best and that is perform.”

But having two top-notch competitors in Taylor and Clay, Sands knows that he will have to step up his game.

“I know that the competition is going to be there, which is a good thing,” he said. “I’m not worried about anything. If you look at how far I came, it’s an amazing thing within itself. The story of me just coming back to where I am right now is what people are going to look at versus the competition.

“I don’t think it will matter what I do. I think all that matters is how I came back and how inspiring and how emotional it has been for some of the younger kids coming up. I think that’s how it’s going to be seen. I don’t think it really matters. People will say Leevan has made an awesome comeback. They will say some people didn’t believe in him, but look at where he is now.”

Four years ago in London, Sands had to be lifted out of the triple jump pit after he blew his knee. As he was placed on the stretcher and placed in the ambulance, he lifted his clinched hand in the air and told me: “Brent, I will be back.”

Now he’s back.

“Just all of the stuff I had to deal with last year, like being on the team, then taken off and then put back on, I had to deal with a whole lot,” he reflected. “I didn’t even have a coach last year, so people will probably look at it from that point of view. Regardless, I’m going to make sure I do whatever it takes to be ready.

“Quite frankly, this might just be my last Olympics. So this year, I just want to have a better year, a better season than last year.”

If Sands doesn’t compete in a meet a week before in Auburn where he resides with his family and trains on his own, he will make the CBBI as his season opener. But whatever he does, Sands wants to make an impression at home. He gives Chris ‘Fireman’ Brown a lot of credit in advance of competing.

“I think Chris is doing an awesome job in trying to promote it,” Sands said. “I guess it’s going to help me too with the competition. A lot of times you want to have big meets and big competitions in our home town because a lot of times when countries host games or meets, people from that country always show up and they perform because they have their country behind them.

“It’s a different feeling when you are home and you have the whole stadium cheering for you, saying ‘let’s go’ and telling you that you can do it. It’s just different. It’s a different hype you get when you are in your own home or your own environment and you have your whole country there giving you their support. It’s not like going to a regular meet on the circuit.”

While he has already qualified for the Rio Olympics, Sands said his ultimate goal this year is to surpass his national record of 17.59m (57ft 8 1/2in) that he set on August 21, 2008, at the Beijing Olympics where he clinched a bronze medal.

If all goes well and there is no threat of the Zika virus, Sands hopes to appear in his fourth Olympiad.

“I’m concerned about the virus,” he said. “I just hope that everything clears up in the next few months. If not, they will have a lot of people boycotting. I think a lot of people will be scared to go over there. So I don’t know what they are going to do, if they are going to fix the situation. But a lot of people are concerned.

“I know I will be concerned because I have family members who are looking to travel too because this could be my last Olympics.”

Sands, a former basketball player, is the most decorated triple jumper in the country, having completed the cycle, winning medals at the four major international meets, including the Central American Championships (gold in 2003 in St George’s and again in 2008 in Cali, Colombia), Pan American Games (silver in 2015 in Toronto), Commonwealth Games (bronze in 2002 in Manchester), World Championships (bronze in 2003 in Paris, France) and Olympics (bronze in 2008 in Beijing).