Wright sets sights on record-breaking season
Published:Friday | February 16, 2024 | 12:10 AMOrane Buchanan/Staff Reporter
AFTER throwing a season’s best of 64.25 metres to finish third behind the pair of Traves Smikle and Fedrick Dacres at last Saturday’s King of the Ring competition at the Courtney Walsh Oval, veteran discus thrower Chad Wright has pointed to changes to his training regime for his good early season performance.
“It’s been going well as I’ve made lot of changes to my background work and it’s showing that they were positive so, I’ll just continue to grow on it. Absolutely, I think I still have much more and it’s just a matter of when I’ll be able to let it all out,” he stated.
The now 32-year-old is a former two-time national throwing champion, having achieved the feat back in the 2013 and 2014 seasons. While giving details on what those specific changes were, Wright revealed that plans are in place to go beyond his personal best of 66.54 metres which he achieved back in 2020, as he thinks he still has what it takes to compete at the highest level and to rub shoulders with the best throwers in the world.
“Along with my coach (Derrick Spencer), what we’ve done is improve upon our lifting programme along with my throwing schedule. It’s not a matter of if I think I’m going to surpass it, I will be going beyond that mark. At King of the Ring, my coach saw one of my throws and said you missed out on that, and I could have gone much further based on his observations,” he added.
Wright, who finished ninth at the Tokyo Olympics, shared that plans are heading in the right direction as his handlers want him to remain sharp by participating regularly heading into senior trials so that he’s on top of his form when the competition kicks off.
“Our plans are going as best as it could be going right now. So, my coach and I are aiming for at least two meets per month so that I’ll be ‘competition sharp’ as we continue to fine-tune my technique heading into trials,” Wright stated.
As for the local talent, Wright said that the country is blessed with decent throwers which augurs well for the future of the sport in Jamaica.
“It has been very competitive over the last few years, especially with the guys in the high school programme. Six throwers went over 60 metres at trials last year and not many countries outside of the United States would have done that,” Wright said.