#Carifta2022 | Cole eyeing 100m spot at World Under-20
Published:Tuesday | April 19, 2022 | 12:09 AMRobert Bailey/Gleaner Writer
Despite winning her first individual gold medal in the long jump competition at the 2022 Carifta Games, multitalented Jamaican athlete Serena Cole has her sights fixed on competing in the 100 metres at this year’s World Under-20 Championships.
Cole, 17, captured her second gold medal at the Carfita Games when she leapt to 5.89 metres to win the under-20 long jump event at the National Stadium yesterday.
Her teammate, Kay-Lagay Clarke, pocketed bronze with a leap of 5.64m while Kayssia Hudson from French Guiana won the silver with a mark of 5.77m.
Cole, the lead-off runner for Jamaica’s 4x100m relay team, which smashed the World Under-20 record on Sunday evening, finished third at the Carifta Trials behind her Edwin Allen High teammates, twin sisters Tina and Tia Clayton.
However, Cole who has a season’s best time 11.51 seconds, said the 100m is her favoured event and therefore she will be concentrating all her efforts on it at the National Trials.
“Right now, I want to do the 100 metres. I did not get a chance to do it at the ISSA/GraceKennedy Boys and Girls’ Athletics Championships but hopefully at the National Junior Trials, I will be doing the 100 metres,” said Cole.
“This is my favourite event and I love it because I prefer the sprint events,” she said.
Cole’s personal best jump of 6.36m this season has already booked a place for her in that event at the World Under-20 Championships, which will be held in Cali, Colombia. She is ranked second in the world this year behind Xiong Shigi of China with 6.37m.
She added that she was not pleased with her efforts in the long jump yesterday because she wanted to achieve a personal best mark.
“I am feeling great about winning my second gold at the Games but I am not pleased about my long jump performance because I did not hit the board on any of my jumps,” Cole said.
“I already have made the qualifying mark in the long jump for the World Under-20 but I wanted to get a personal best today so I am disappointed that I did not achieve this at the Carifta Games,” she said.