The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

FRESH off his gold medal performance at the Central American and Caribbean (CAC) Games last week in Barranquilla, Colombia, high jumper Donald Thomas will lead the 17-member team that will represent the Bahamas at the North American and Central American and Caribbean (NACAC) Senior Track and Field Championships.

Compacted into a three-day schedule from Friday to Sunday, the meet will be held at the Varsity Stadium in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and the Bahamas will compete against some of the featured teams from the United States of America, Canada, Jamaica, Trinidad & Tobago and Cuba.

Unlike the CAC Games, NACAC is offering prize money totalling $200,000 Canadian dollars for the winners, inclusive of $2,000 for 1st place, $1,000 for 2nd place and $350 for 3rd place for individual events, while relay teams will split $4,500 for 1st place, $2,000 for 2nd place and $1,000 for third place.

Puma, a premier sponsor of the meet and a number of international athletes, will also offer an event bonus for the men’s and women’s 100m, men’s and women’s 4x100m and the women’s pole vault of $6,000 for 1st place, $3,000 for 2nd place and $1,000 for 3rd place.

Hoping to cash in on the incentives being offered in Canada is Thomas, who will be joined in the men’s high jump by Jamaal Wilson, who got a fifth place finish at the CAC Games. Thomas soared to the gold for the only medal won by the Bahamas in track and field in Colombia.

Surprisingly, Joanna Evans picked up three gold and two silver and Albury Higgs got a bronze in swimming to give the Bahamas a total of seven medals for 10th place on the final placing chart as the Bahamas produced its best performance outside of track and field at the CAC Games.

Other members of the track team at the CAC Games competing at the NACAC Championships are Katrina Seymour, who didn’t advance out of the women’s 400m hurdles, Kaiwan Culmer, who was sixth in the men’s triple jump final, Alonzo Russell, sixth in the men’s 400m final and he will team up once again with Kendrick Thompson, Michael Mathieu and Stephen ‘Dirty’ Newbold, who placed fifth in the men’s 4 x 400m relay.

Ojay Ferguson and Anthony Adderley will be added to the pool.

Warren Fraser, Teray Smith and Cliff Resias will contest the men’s sprints.

Devynne Charlton, who made the CAC Games team but didn’t compete, will be entered in the women’s 100m hurdles, Bianca ‘BB’ Stuart will contest the women’s long jump, Tamara Myers will be in the women’s triple jump and Ty’Nia Gaither will represent the country in the women’s 200m.

Dexter Bodie, the team manager, will travel along with head coach Wendell Collie and assistant coaches Dereck Wells, Patrick Adderley and David Charlton.

Dr Kent Bazard will serve as the team doctor and Michael Armbrister will be the physiotherapist.

Bahamas Association of Athletic Associations president Rosamunde Carey and assistant secretary general Mabelene ‘May’ Miller will also travel to the meet and will be involved in the congress meeting.

Canadian record holder Rosey Edeh (400-metre hurdles), while triple Olympic medallist Andre De Grasse and Aaron Brown, a Toronto-native tipped to be one of the sprinters to watch in the post-Usain Bolt era, will be one of the big name stars competing at the NACAC Championships.

The international event will play host to more than 500 athletes from 28 countries, with numerous Olympic medallists as well as world champions, making it one of the most star-studded international track and field competitions in Canadian history and for NACAC, which is headed by Victor Lopez.

Among the list of other competitors entered are 2008 and 2012 Olympic champion in the 100-metres, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce highlights Team Jamaica, along with 400-metre specialist Stephanie Ann McPherson, both coming off Diamond League wins in London last month.

Joining Fraser-Pryce and McPherson in Toronto is world leader in the discus, Fedrick Dacres, who already has a victory in Toronto on his résumé, winning the gold medal at the 2015 Pan American Games.

Olympic medallists Sherika Jackson (400-metre and 4x400m), Christine Day (4x400m), Fitzroy Dunkley (4x400m) as well as World Championship medallists Shashalee Forbes (4x100m), Danielle Williams (100-metre hurdles), and O’Dayne Richards (shot put) will also be contenders for Jamaica.

On Team USA, 2016 Olympic silver medallist in the pole vault, Sandi Morris, will lead the team on the field. On the track, the world record holder in the 100-metre hurdles, Kendra Harrison, will be bringing the season’s fastest time, while 400m-hurdler Shamier Little is coming off a Diamond League victory in London as well.

Members of the US Olympic gold medal winning 4x400m team, Phyllis Francis and Courtney Okolo, along with World Championship medallists Jenna Prandini (4x100m), Ajee Wilson (800-metre), Michael Cherry (4x400), and Mason Finley (discus) round out those to keep an eye on.

Juan Miguel Echevarria, a 19-year-old long jump phenom from Cuba, will be in Toronto as the world leader in the men’s long jump, having jumped 8.68 in Germany as well as a wind-aided 8.83-metres in Stockholm earlier this year.

Other notable athletes to keep an eye on from the international teams will be Cuba’s Yarisley Silva (2012 Olympic silver medallist, 2015 world champion in the pole vault) and Trinidad & Tobago’s Olympic medallists Keston Bledman (silver at the 2008 and 2012 Olympics in the 4x100m) and Deon Lendore (2012 Olympic bronze medallist in the 4x400m).