Leeward Islands Jr. Champs Ends With 17 Records Falling

For 650 meters of their U17 Girls race, Carifta Games finalists Guadeloupe's Cheryl Farial , left, and the BVI's Lakeisha "Mimi" Warner engaged in an epic 800m battle, before Warner unleashed a ferocious kick to win in a personal best of 2 minutes 10.92 seconds, with Farial also running a best of 2:13.73.

JUNE 11—At Sunday’s conclusion of the 2012 Leeward Islands Jr. Track and Field Championships, the 17th meet record fell when hosts British Virgin Islands’ Under 20 Boys 4x400m relay quartet of Tarique Moses, Shaquoy Stephens, Kyron McMaster and Khari Herbert, broke the meet record and a 20-year old All Comers Record with a new National Jr. Record time of 3 minutes, 17.00 seconds, for the ninth record of the day. BVI athletes accounted for nine of the 17 records.

The 4x4 time chopped six seconds off the 3:23.01 meet record set by the U.S. Virgin Islands in 2006. It also cut the territory’s 19-year old National Jr. standard of 3:21.03 from 1993 with the foursome of Ralston Varlack, Steve Augustine, Keita Cline and Mario Todman.  

The 3:17.00 time also broke the 20-year old All-Comers Record of 3:18.1 set by the U.S. Virgin Islands team of Randy Wheatley, Irvine Mason, Ulric Jackson and Neville Hodge in 1982.

At the end of the meet, the BVI had amassed 44 medals, Antigua 32, U.S. Virgin Islands 17, Anguilla 13, Guadeloupe 3 and Trinidad and Tobago 1.

Anguilla’s Zaniel Hughes who set the U20 Boys 100m meet and All Comers record on Saturday with his 10.45 seconds run, claimed Antigua and Barbuda’s Richard Richardson’s 200m mark of 21.35 seconds from 2006, by cutting the tape at 21.26 into a -2.0 headwind. The Carifta Games 100m bronze medalist times were also Anguilla National Records and he claimed the Most Outstanding Male Performer of the meet award.

The BVI’s Lakeisha “Mimi” Warner—a Carifta Games U17 Girls 800m bronze medalist—earned Outstanding Female Performance of the meet. For 650m, Warner ran stride for stride with fellow Carifta Games finalist Cheryl Farial of Guadeloupe before powering home to victory to demolish Antigua and Barbuda’s Kenryca Francis’ 4-year old mark of 2 minutes, 20.30 seconds stopping the clock at 2:10.92. Warner’s mark lowered Samantha John’s 3-year old 2:13.68 All Comers Record and improved her National Youth Record from 2:13.80 earlier in the season.

Farial who ran 2:14.49 at home last week, improved to a personal best 2:13.73, the third best female time ever run in the territory.

Antigua and Barbuda’s Matthew Mitchell ran the U17 Boys 800m in 2:03.73, to eclipse St. Kitts’ Kadeem Smith’s 2006 time of 2:04.00.

On the field, Carifta Games U17 Girls Javelin Throw gold medalist Tynelle Gumbs of the BVI, had a heave of 36.05m with the 500Kg spear to establish a new mark.

Her teammate Kevin Vanterpool in the same division, wiped out St. Kitts’ Chetal Evans’ 2006 mark of 46.61m, with a personal best heave of 48.18m with the 700Kg spear.

Anguilla’s DeeAnn Rodgers, the Carifta Games Heptathlon bronze medalist, scored 3813 points to establish a new meet record, as the event was contested for the first time, while Guadeloupe’ s Elsa Plante—a Carifta Games U17 Girls 100m Hurdles bronze medalist—ran 14.49 to establish a meet and All Comers Record.

After individual duties, the BVI’s U17 Girls 4x400m squad of Tarika “Tinker Bell” Moses, Warner, Jonel Lacey and Taylor Hill—who notched an U17 Girls sprint double—shattered the meet record of 3 minutes, 56.5 established in 2006 by another BVI foursome of Bianca Dougan, Ashley Kelly, Britney Wattley and Dominique Maloney, when they churned 3:49.19. The mark was also a National Youth Record, breaking the 3:49.68 by Dougan, Wattley, Kelly and Chantel Malone set in 2006.