Liam Car­ring­ton swam to T&T’s first gold medal on the sec­ond night of fi­nals when the Cen­tral Amer­i­can and Caribbean Swim­ming Fed­er­a­tion (CC­CAN) Cham­pi­onship con­tin­ued at the Mer­liot Sports Cen­tre in San Sal­vador, El Sal­vador on Tues­day night.

The 14-year-old Car­ring­ton won the 13-14 boys' 200 me­tres in­di­vid­ual med­ley in two min­utes and 10.92 sec­onds for the gold medal, well ahead of Mex­i­co’s Jairo Mon­zon who took sil­ver in 2:11.90 and an­oth­er Mex­i­can Fer­nan­do Ro­driguez, who fin­ished in 2:15.37 while T&T’s oth­er en­trant in the fi­nal, Liam Roberts was fifth in 2:20.92.

Car­ring­ton al­so added a bronze medal in the 200m freestyle in a time of 2:00.56, to fin­ish be­hind Mex­i­can Fran­co So­ria who won in 1:58.56, and Jose An­to­nio Ra­mon, the sil­ver medal­list in 1:59.25.

T&T swim­mers al­so won two sil­ver medals via Dar­ren Bel­fon and USA-based Aqeel Joseph, while the trio of Amari Ash, Bre­an­na Bel­mar and Ty­la Ho A Shu added a bronze medal to in­crease the medal haul to sev­en at the end of the first two days of com­pe­ti­tion.

Bel­fon, 14, got to the wall in 26.33 for the sec­ond spot in the 13-14 boys’ 50m but­ter­fly, just be­hind Hait­ian win­ner Chris­t­ian Jerome (26.30 sec­onds), with Mex­i­co’s Er­ick Vil­lal­pan­do, third in 26.58 while 20-year-old Joseph picked up his sil­ver medal in the 18 and Over boys’ 50m but­ter­fly in 25.08, to fin­ish be­hind Pana­man­ian Jean-Car­lo Calderon’s win­ning time of 24.90, with Mex­i­co’s Guiller­mo Cruz, third in 25.09, while T&T’s Jo­hann-Matthew Mata­moro was sev­enth in 25.71.

Ash se­cured her bronze medal in the 15-17 girls' 50m but­ter­fly when she touched the wall in 29.03 to trail Mex­i­can duo, Kar­la Vi­dal (28.76), and Daniela Es­pinosa (28.95).

Bel­mar had to set­tle for the bronze medal in the 11-12 girls’ 100m breast­stroke in 1:21.50 with Mex­i­cans again tak­ing the top two spots via Elisa Perez in 1:19.41, and Va­le­ria Loya in 1:21.11 while T&T’s oth­er com­peti­tor in the fi­nal, Rae­gan Bel­mar, Bre­an­na’s twin-sis­ter was sixth in 1:26.15.

Ho A Shu picked up her first piece of sil­ver when she placed third in the 15-17 girls' 100m breast­stroke in 1:15,48, with Mex­i­co’s Maria Sanchez, tak­ing gold in 1:12.55, and her com­pa­tri­ot, sil­ver in 1:14.97.

Last year in Christ Church, Bar­ba­dos, T&T won four gold medals among 13 medals (four gold, four sil­ver, and five bronze) for the tenth spot on the medal ta­ble at the five-day swim­ming seg­ment.

Lead­ing this year’s medal hunt for T&T is USA-based duo, long-dis­tance swim­mer Gra­ham Cha­toor and Joseph of the Uni­ver­si­ty of In­di­anapo­lis along with Roberts, Car­ring­ton, Aaron Siewlal, and Zachary An­tho­ny.

For­mer Min­is­ter of Sports and Olympic swim coach Anil Roberts is the head coach of the team while Mark Pouchet, the head coach of the re­cent Carif­ta team is serv­ing as his as­sis­tant, with Lilas Solomon-Stu­art, the team man­ag­er, and Kei­th Mata­mor­ro, the chap­er­one.

The 12 days of com­pe­ti­tion which be­gan on Mon­day al­so in­volves the oth­er aquat­ic dis­ci­plines of wa­ter po­lo, artis­tic swim­ming, open wa­ter, and div­ing.

T&T team will open its cam­paign in the Open Wa­ter com­pe­ti­tion from Sun­day.

In ad­di­tion to T&T, Mex­i­co, Haiti, Pana­ma and Hon­duras, swim­mers from An­tigua & Bar­bu­da, Guatemala, Aru­ba, Ba­hamas, Bar­ba­dos, Ja­maica, Bermu­da, Méx­i­co, British Vir­gin Is­lands, Nicaragua, Cay­man Is­lands, Pana­ma, Cos­ta Ri­ca, Puer­to Ri­co, Cu­ba, St Kitts & Nevis, Cu­ra­cao, St Lu­cia, Do­mini­ca, St Vin­cent and The Grenadines, Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic, host E Sal­vador, Turks and Caicos, Grena­da, US Vir­gin Is­lands, Saint Maarten, and An­guil­la are com­pet­ing.

The cit­i­zens of Colom­bia, Guyana, Suri­name, and Venezuela may, with­out be­ing mem­bers of the CC­CAN, par­tic­i­pate in these cham­pi­onships through their re­spec­tive fed­er­a­tions if they re­ceive the ap­proval and au­tho­ri­sa­tion of the South Amer­i­can Con­fed­er­a­tion (CON­SANAT), to which they are af­fil­i­at­ed.

Ad­di­tion­al­ly, the res­i­dents of Bonaire, Sa­ba, and St Eu­sta­tius may, with­out be­ing mem­bers of the CC­CAN, par­tic­i­pate in these cham­pi­onships. Equal­ly, the res­i­dents of Guadalupe, Mar­tinique, and French Guiana may par­tic­i­pate through their re­spec­tive as­so­ci­a­tions, pro­vid­ed they ob­tain the ap­proval of the French Swim­ming Fed­er­a­tion.

Oth­er T&T swim­mers' re­sults on Tues­day:

Rae­gan Bel­mar: 8th – 11-12 girls' 200m freestyle – 2:24.21

Liam Roberts: 5th – 13-14 boys' 100m breast­stroke – 1:11.74

An­pherne Bernard: 6th – 13-14 boys' 100m breast­stroke – 1:11.75

Ly­la Browne: 5th – 15-17 boys' 200m in­di­vid­ual med­ley – 2:30.28

Zachary An­tho­ny: 6th – 15-17 boys' 200m in­di­vid­ual med­ley – 2:13.94

G Vick­les, T Ho A Shu, L Browne, A Ra­jack: 4th – 15-17 girls' 4x100m med­ley re­lay – 4:42.28

CC­CAN Swim­ming Team:

Girls:

11-12: Tay­lor Marchan, Rae­gan Bel­mar, Bre­an­na Bel­mar

15-17: Gabrielle Vick­les, Ty­la Ho A Shu, Amari Ash, Ly­la Browne, Amelia Ra­jack

18 & Over: Or­nel­la Walk­er

Boys:

11-12: Aaron Siewlal

13-14: Dar­ren Bel­fon, Liam Roberts, Liam Car­ring­ton, An­pherne Bernard, Jonathan Sam­bra­no

15-17: Zachary An­tho­ny

18 & Over: Aqeel Joseph, Gra­ham Cha­toor, Chris­t­ian Awah, Jo­hann-Matthew Mata­mor­ro

Of­fi­cials: Anil Roberts (head coach), Mark Pouchet (as­sis­tant coach), Lilas Solomon-Stu­art (man­ag­er), Kei­th Mata­mor­ro (chap­er­one)

Open Wa­ter team:

Girls:

12-13: Tay­lor Marchan, Mare­na Mar­tinez, Zara Per­sko

14-17: Syd­ney Look Fong

18 & Over: Sha­nia David

Boys:

14-17: Zachary An­tho­ny, Isa­iah Alexan­der, Adam Scoon

18 & Over: Rique­lio Joseph, Isaac Tuberoso, Pe­tert Trepte

Of­fi­cials: Mau­rice Faria, Lilas Solomon-Stu­art (man­ag­er), Mar­sha Trepte (chap­er­one)