While many people were enjoying a leisurely Easter holiday weekend, the 2024 cohort of young CARIFTA athletes was working hard to represent the Cayman Islands on the world stage, and represent they did.
Swimmers at the Bahamas-hosted CARIFTA Aquatics Championship brought spectators to their feet, cheering at a deafening level while the athletes broke tournament records, won both nail-biting 50-metre sprints and 1,500m endurance races, and brought home 50 medals over four days.
Meanwhile, Caymanian athletes were busy earning four medals in the track-and-field competition in Grenada, and taking the high point trophy in artistic swim in Florida, earning a record 14 medals.
Rounding out the events, swimmers completed an open water 5K in the Bahamas on 3 April and took another five medals.
Teams flew home that same day and were met at the Owen Roberts International Airport by cheering friends and family bearing flowers, welcome signs and even customised balloons to celebrate their success this year.
Team rankings
The 44-member aquatics team came second with its collective score. The Bahamas by far had the most athletes competing and earned 1,096.5 points, making it number one for the sixth year in a row.
Though there was some mid-competition jockeying for second place, the Cayman Islands beat Trinidad and Tobago 660 to 639, though the latter got the edge in the medal count.
The Bahamas took home 101 medals total; Trinidad and Tobago came away with 56; and the Cayman Islands earned 50.
Cayman Islands Aquatic Sports Association president Steve Broadbelt told the Compass upon arriving at the airport that programme leaders are incredibly proud of this year’s showing and how these athletes have honed their talents over the years.
While it will be difficult to bid farewell to those athletes ageing out of the competition, he said the Cayman Islands will continue to cheer them on wherever they go, potentially to Olympic events.
The programme will also continue investing in the training of its up-and-coming athletes, like 13-year-old Lennox Turnham-Wheatley. He impressed on day one with a time of 17:46:26 in the 1,500m freestyle, shaving a full 30 seconds off his initial time.
An explosive start
From the very start, the Cayman Islands had people talking about its impressive performances at the newly renovated Betty Kelly-Kenning Aquatic Centre in Nassau.
Swimmer Jillian Crooks set a new meet record in the preliminary round of the 100m butterfly during the first day with an official time of 1:01:76. The 17-year-old edged out the previous record of 1:02:14 set by Jamaican swimmer Sabrina Lyn.
Throughout the competition, the Caymanian swimmers maintained a presence in a wide variety of events and medalled in key ones.
They ended on a high for day one with a strong showing in the relays.
The standout was the team consisting of Crooks, Sierrah Broadbelt, Sofia Bonati and Harper Barrowman that left commentators exclaiming, “This is insane.”
Though their final time didn’t quite break the previous record, they took gold in 3:58:94.
Closing out the first day, the Cayman Islands had garnered 12 medals in the pool: three gold, four silver, and five bronze.
Going for gold
The team maintained a strong presence during the pool-based races, taking home 24 gold medals over the four days.
The Cayman Islands National Song rang out back to back on 31 March, celebrating first-place finishes by Broadbelt, 15, and Will Sellars, 17, in the women’s and men’s 15-17 400m individual medley.
Also earning individual gold were James Allison, Barrowman, Crooks, and Riley Watson.
The Cayman Islands team held strong to the end, securing three medals in the final freestyle relays on 2 April, adding to hardware earned in the 50m freestyle, 200m backstroke and other individual races.
Steve Broadbelt said the coaches ask a lot of their athletes, who trained before sunrise and put in countless hours to prepare for the games. But it paid off.
“They say swimming isn’t a team sport, but we proved that quite wrong,” he said of this year’s performances.
Track and field
Track-and-field coach Tyrone Yen said when his team arrived home from Grenada where the athletics events were held, that it had been “an awesome four days of competition,” and they were grateful for all the community support.
“The kids have done tremendously well, and I think they deserve all the accolades,” he told the Compass.
Davonte Howell took gold in the men’s U20 100m dash finals with his personal best time of 10.15 seconds, nearing the championship record of 10.11 set in 2007 by Jamaican Yohan Blake. Jaiden Reid was close behind Howell, finishing in 10.34 seconds. Howell also won bronze in the 200m.
Delora Johnson, 15, placed eighth in the women’s U17 high jump with 1.55 metres.
In shot put, Brianna Smith, 19, earned bronze in the women’s U20 final. She achieved a distance of 12.86m, following 13.58m for the Bahamas athlete and 13.68m for the Jamaican.
Yen also noted that Anthony Chin took fourth in the men’s long jump. Despite having a relatively small delegation this year, the team ranked eighth out of 24 countries in overall team scores.
‘Big statement’ in open water
Rounding out the CARIFTA events, the open-water swim competition took place the morning of 3 April at Goodman’s Bay in the Bahamas.
Some familiar names cropped up in the medal count for the 5-kilometre races. Connor Macdonald, 17, won gold in the men’s 16-18, and Dominic Hilton took silver.
Winning bronze in their age categories were Teagan Nash, Lennox Turnham-Wheatley and Watson.
Macdonald, who competed in many of the long-distance events, told the Compass that it was challenging to face the elements for a final lengthy swim following four full days of pool races. But he knew he had to leave it all on the table for his last event.
He said conditions were great and the water was clear, so he and Hilton were in a prime position to excel. Macdonald said he bore in mind that this would be his last CARIFTA event, so he gave everything he had for a photo finish.
“It was a big statement for the open-water programme here in Cayman,” he said of the pair’s medals.
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