Jamaica’s swimmers more than surpassed the 30-medals and third place finish anticipated by head coach Wendy Lee heading into the four day CARIFTA Championships which ended in Barbados, on Tuesday.
The Jamaicans recorded their largest medal haul with 64 medals – 17 gold, 26 silver and 21 bronze and finished second in the overall points standing with a total of 833.75.
The Bahamas won with 975 points, with the Cayman Islands third on 754 points, fourth went to the hosts with 519-points with Trinidad and Tobago on 355 points rounding out the top five.
Alrick Swaby tells us more.
Jamaica’s highest medal tally came on the final day amassing 18 medals across the 50m freestyle, 100m breaststroke, 200m backstroke and the 4-by- 50-metres freestyle relays.
The 50m freestyle medalists included Christanya Shirley – gold -, Mackenzie Headley – bronze -, Zaneta Alvaranga – silver – and Nathaniel Thomas – bronze.
Those who medalled in the 100-metres breaststroke were Kai Lawson – gold, Sabrina Lyn – gold and Mackenzie Headley – silver.
In the 200m backstroke series, the team won gold in the 13 – 14 boys’ by Brady Macpherson-Lewison, silver in the 13 -14 girls by Carolyn Levy-Powell, bronze in the 13 – 14 boys by Zack-Andre Johnson and bronze in the girls 15 – 17 by Leanna Wainwright.
The lone medal in the 400m freestyle series came courtesy of Davia Richardson who won bronze in the 13 – 14 girls.
Jamaica secured medals in all six of the 4-by-50 metres freestyle relays on offer for the evening.
Of note was the performance by the 15 – 17 girls who won in a championship record of 1:47.91 and in the final event of the evening the 15 – 17 boys 4-by-50 metres freestyle relay brought the house down with a bronze medal performance, setting a new national age group record and a national senior record 1:37.79.
Vice president of the Aquatic Sports Association, Georgia Sinclair, says the team exceeded their expectation.
