Ricketts impressed IOC top brass en route to flagbearer honour

Two-time World Championship triple jump silver medallist Shanieka Ricketts will join a long list of Jamaican Olympians to wave the national flag at the Olympic Games opening ceremony in Paris on July 26. The announcement was made yesterday during a media briefing at the Jamaica Olympic Association (JOA) headquarters.

Ricketts, who will be competing at her third Olympic Games, will be joined by swimmer Josh Kirlew who will be the men’s flagbearer for the opening ceremony. Kirlew will be making his Olympic debut.

JOA Chief Executive Officer Ryan Foster said that Ricketts not only exhibited the values that the Olympic movement required but received rave reviews from members of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) when President Thomas Bach visited the island in March last year.

“She epitomises what a true Olympian is. And I think with her accolades on the field, whether at a World Championships or the Olympic Games, she also represents what Olympic values are in terms of friendship, fairness and humility,” Foster said.

“Her interaction when President Bach came last year, some of the feedback from the IOC personnel in terms of how she carried herself, represent the Olympic values to which we want a flagbearer to showcase.”

Multiple Olympic and World Championships representative Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce was the women’s flagbearer during the Tokyo Games in 2021 and Foster said that similar to Fraser-Pryce, Ricketts embodies the qualities of a true Olympian.

Ricketts will face a deep field in the women’s triple jump as she seeks to earn Jamaica’s first Olympic medal in the event. She finished fourth at the Tokyo Games in 2021 and fourth last year at the World Championships in Budapest.

It will also be an opportunity for swimming to be in the spotlight, acknowledging the achievements of Jamaican aquatics who have participated at the Games in at least one discipline since 1996. Foster said that similar to boxer Ricardo Brown who carried the flag in Tokyo in his Olympic debut, Kirlew’s opportunity will be memorable.

“We believe that small member associations should also be given an opportunity to represent and to carry the flag. And I think Mr Kirlew, this being his first Olympic Games like Ricardo Brown in 2021, gives us the perfect opportunity to showcase that Jamaica in aquatics has done very well,” Foster said. “Outside of Alia this is the seventh or eighth straight Olympic Games that the aquatics association, whether via diving or by swimming, has qualified representatives for the Games.”

Kirlew, 24, was born in England and qualified for the men’s 100m butterfly event through universality as well as Sabrina Lyn who will compete in the women’s 50m freestyle. Universality places are available in the qualification systems of select sports for nations with traditionally small delegations. These universality places are designed to increase the diversity of participating nations across the sports programme of the Olympic Games.

Daniel Wheeler