Juniors make history on the track and in the field

THE YEAR 2022 for junior athletics was marked for its history-making moments, a return to normality both on and off the track for high schools, and a continuation of the dominance at the regional level.

It was also a year that saw the highest of highs and extreme lows off the track.

Champs 2022: Return to normality, KC get back their crown, Edwin Allen keep theirs

The 2022 ISSA/GraceKennedy Boys and Girls’ Athletics Championships returned with fans back in the stands to witness the spectacle and intensity that the COVID-19 pandemic denied them last year. Those returning fans witnessed the return of Kingston College to the top of the track and field pile, the school claiming its 33rd hold on the Mortimer Geddes Trophy. Jamaica College had edged them out last year.

Edwin Allen, for the ninth time and their eighth straight, fended off the challenge of Hydel High and St Jago. But Jamaica and the world got a glimpse of the future of Jamaican athletics with standout performances.

In the highly anticipated Class One girls’ 100m showdown between Hydel’s Brianna Lyston, and the Clayton twins, Tina and Tia from Edwin Allen, Tina showed her class, retaining the title in a final that went to the wire in 11.23 seconds. But Lyston would have her moment in the Class One 200m final, breaking the record in the process when she stopped the clock in 22.53. It also saw defining performances of athletes such as Kingston College’s Jaydon Hibbert, who won the Class One boys’ long jump and triple jump double, the latter in a Champs record.

The performances of those athletes would set the stage for what would be a landmark summer.

Carifta Games 2022: Triumph and Breakouts

At the last minute, Jamaica took responsibility to host the 2022 Carfita Games, the first Games since the COVID-19 pandemic, a week after Champs. The host nation continued their superiority amassing 92 medals, with the junior athletes performing well in front of their home crowd. Other Caribbean athletes also endeared themselves with their display, most notable among them being Adaejah Hodge from the British Virgin Islands, who captured the Under-17 100m, 200m and long jump titles. For her efforts, she won the Austin Sealy Trophy for the most outstanding athlete at the games.

It was also the stage where the quartet of Tina and Tia Clayton, Serena Cole and Lyston delivered an earth-shattering performance in setting what was expected to be a new Under-20 world record in the 4x100m relay, clocking 42.58 to lower their own mark of 42.94 at the 2021 Under-20 World Championships in Kenya.

What should have been a proud moment for Jamaica has instead gone unheralded as World Athletics rejected the time because one of the members of the team was not drug-tested at the completion of the race. The news sparked anger and criticism directed at the Jamaica Anti-Doping Commission with calls for the board to be dismissed as a consequence. But while the anger and frustration experienced in June still lingers, there was light at the end of the tunnel two months later.

Jamaica ended the World Under-20 Championships in Cali, Colombia, with the most medals at the games with 16 although they finished second behind the United States, having had fewer gold medals (six) than their rivals (seven).

Tina Clayton retained her 100m title in a championship record of 10.95 seconds with other gold-medal performances coming from 100m hurdler Kerrica Hill, high jumper Brandon Pottinger, Hibbert in the triple jump in a championship record leap of 17.27 metres, Lyston in the 200m and redemption in the girls’ 4x100m. With Hill replacing Lyston from the team that ran at Carifita, Jamaica left no doubt, lowering last year’s mark to 42.59.

The year also saw the end of the junior journeys for some, with the Clayton sisters signing professional contracts and joining MVP Track Club, Hill joining Elite Performance and others heading to universities in the United States.