T&T Olympians Richard Thompson and Michelle-Lee Ahye both ran impressive times to capture gold medals in the men and women's 100m events, respectively, at the Ponce Grand Prix, at Paquito Montaner Stadium, in Ponce, Puerto Rico, on Saturday night.
T&T and the Caribbean were well represented in the men's event, with Thompson (10.21) taking the win just ahead of fellow countryman Keston Bledman (10.24), and Antoine Adams (10.27) of St Kitts and Nevis.
Thompson also appeared in the 200m final but finished sixth against as many athletes with a 21.08 finish. Panama's Alonso Edwards won in 19.81 to break the meet record.
Meanwhile, Ahye was on top of her game clocking a personal best time of 11.04 seconds en route to victory, well ahead of USA's Alexandria Anderson and Jamaica's Carrie Russell, who clocked 11.24 and 11.32, respectively.
In the men's 400m dash, T&T's Renny Quow clocked 45.36 to finish fourth, behind meet record breakers Lashawn Merrit (44.14) of the USA, Luguelin Santos (44.53) of Dominican Republic and third-placed David Verburg (44.78), another American.
Also bringing glory to the Caribbean were Patricia Hall, women's 400m winner (51.55), and Kineke Alexander of St Vincent, who took silver in the same event in 51.70. Barbadian Shane Brathwaite won the men's 110m hurdles in 13.37 seconds. Jamaica's Nicholas Gordon finished second in the men's long jump with a 7.65m effort.
Meanwhile, Olympic javelin gold medalist Keshorn Walcott returned to action at the second phase of the Diamond League, in Shanghai, China, yesterday, throwing a season-best 81.09m, in a seventh-placed finish among 12 athletes.
Walcott, the only participant to complete all six throws without faults, made his best attempt on his fourth try. His other attempts reached 80.68m, 77.87, 76.37, 76.86 and 77.19. He finished over eight metres behind Egypt's Abd Ihad El Rahman, who secured an arena record, meet record and a world leading mark with a monsterous 89.21 throw on his opening attempt.
Sweden's Kim Amb and Vitezslav Vesely of the Czech Republic placed second and third with 84.14m and 83.80, respectively. Julius Yego (Kenya, 83.0m), Dmitriy Tarabin (Russia, 82.66), both also securing season bests and Tero Pitkamaki (Finland, 81.38), all finished ahead of Walcott.
Jehue Gordon placed sixth, clocking 49.56 seconds in the men's 400m hurdles. USA's Michael Tinsley, whose reaction was the slowest, eased to a meet record with a 48.77 run for a first-placed finish. Senegal's Mamadou Masse Hanne (48.86) finished second with a season best, while another American Bershawn Jackson (48.92) placed third.
Another T&T athlete, Mikel Thomas was in 110m hurdles action and ended eighth of nine competitors in 13.64 seconds.
The race was tight with China's Wenjun Xie (13.23), France's Pascal Martinot-Lagarde (13.26) and USA's David Oliver (13.28) placing first to third, respectively.
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