Joshua Ro­many booked his placed on the na­tion­al swim­ming squad for the Fourth FI­NA World Ju­nior Swim­ming Cham­pi­onships 2013 in Dubai (Unit­ed-Arab-Emi­rate) from Au­gust 26 - 31, when he bet­tered the qual­i­fy­ing time for the 15-17 boys 50m but­ter­fly event.

This was on the open­ing day of the five-day Am­a­teur Swim­ming As­so­ci­a­tion of T&T Na­tion­al Age-Group Long Course Cham­pi­onships at the Mar­lins Swim­ming Pool, Morne Co­co Road, West­moor­ings, on Wednes­day night.

Ro­many, swim­ming un­at­tached, touched the wall in 25.22 sec­onds in the qual­i­fy­ing round for the fi­nals to bet­ter the qual­i­fy­ing time for World Ju­niors (25.47). Sec­ond was At­lantis' David Mc Leod in 27.29 and Ti­tans' Jonathan Ramkissoon, third in 27.68, while the fi­nal of the event was con­test­ed last night.

Ro­many al­so con­vinc­ing­ly won the fi­nals of the 400m freestyle in his age-group in 4:10.03, beat­ing the qual­i­fy­ing time (4:11.49 mins) for the June 29 - Ju­ly 5, Cen­tral Amer­i­can and Caribbean Am­a­teur Swim­ming Con­fed­er­a­tion (CC­CAN) Cham­pi­onships to be held in San Jose, Cos­ta Ri­ca.

Jabari Bap­tiste (4:26.58) and Ji­van Chee Foon (4:41.99), both of whom al­so swam un­at­tached were sec­ond and third, re­spec­tive­ly, in the fi­nal.

Tidal Wave's Jeron O'Brien (2:33.37) post­ed a Carif­ta B time (which is 2:33.66) as well as CC­CAN qual­i­fy­ing time (which is 2:34.47) when he won gold in the 15-17 boys 200m breast­stroke fi­nal ahead of Jonathan Ramkissoon (2:33.78), who col­lect­ed sil­ver, and bronze medal­list Jonathan Gillette (2:36.26) of Mar­lins.

In the fi­nals of the 18 & over boys 200m breast­stroke, At­lantis' Abra­ham Mc Leod won the gold medal in 2:28.26, a qual­i­fy­ing time for CC­CAN, ahead of UTT's Mosi De­noon (2:39.45) and Tor­pe­does' Ooronko Forde (3:01.33).

At­lantis' Ja­da Chai's time of 31.66 in the 11-12 girls 50m but­ter­fly al­so at­tained a CC­CAN qual­i­fy­ing time as she was among the no­table per­form­ers in the ju­niors swim­mers.

She was trailed by Maris­sa Pakette (33.44) of Point Fortin Aqua Darts and Deshor Ed­wards (33.98) of Sil­ver Sharks Swim Club. In the boys' equiv­a­lent, Tidal Wave's Kael Yorke was the top qual­i­fi­er for to­mor­row's fi­nal when he won in 30.58, a Carif­ta B time, ahead of Sil­ver Sharks' Jeron Thomp­son (31.92) and Blue Dol­phin's Marc An­tho­ny Beck­les (33.96).

Ti­tans' Ami­ra Pil­grim post­ed a Carif­ta B time when she won the pre­lim­i­nary 13-14 girls 50m but­ter­fly in 30.93 ahead of Tor­pe­does' Jew­el Mul­rain (32.55) and T'Shelle Williams (32.96), al­so of Ti­tans.

Kristin Julien (Ti­tans), who has al­ready qual­i­fied for World Ju­niors, was the top qual­i­fi­er go­ing in­to the fi­nals of the 15-17 girls 50m but­ter­fly when she touched the wall in 29.80 ahead of un­at­tached swim­mer Jes­si­ca Gay (31.48) and Ti­tans' John­nya Fer­di­nand (32.86).

This year, the num­ber of par­tic­i­pants for the Long Course Cham­pi­onship has in­creased by al­most ten per cent com­pared to last year with 274 ath­letes par­tic­i­pat­ing in this pre­mier event that fa­cil­i­tates qual­i­fi­ca­tion for the Carif­ta 2013 Swim Cham­pi­onships which will be held in Ja­maica from March 29 to April 2.

Over­all, 124 events are be­ing con­test­ed and lo­cal­ly-based Mc Leod broth­ers (Joshua and Abra­ham) to­geth­er with Ro­many, Bap­tiste, Julien, Syr­i­ah David, Pil­grim, Ariel Cape and Mul­rain as well as for­eign-based Alexan­dria Don­ahue are ex­pect­ed to give good swims on their way to qual­i­fi­ca­tion.

Re­main­ing sched­ule:

To­day: 6 pm

To­mor­row: Ses­sion One - 9 am & Ses­sion Two - 6 pm

Sun­day: Ses­sion One - 9 am & Ses­sion Two - 6 pm

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