Paris, France St Lu­cian Julien Al­fred and Do­mini­can Thea La Fond sprin­kled Caribbean star dust on the Paris Olympics, con­jur­ing up mag­i­cal per­for­mances to de­liv­er his­toric gold medals for their re­spec­tive na­tions on Sat­ur­day.

On a phe­nom­e­nal night for the re­gion in the French cap­i­tal, the 23-year-old Al­fred stunned reign­ing World cham­pi­on Sha’Car­ri Richard­son of the Unit­ed States in the 100-me­tre fi­nal, clock­ing a new na­tion­al record of 10.72 sec­onds, to se­cure St Lu­cia’s first ever medal at an Olympiad.

The cel­e­bra­tions were still at fever pitch near­ly 7,000 miles away in St Lu­cia’s cap­i­tal Cas­tries when the 30-year-old La Fond pro­duced a new na­tion­al record of 15.02 me­tres in the women’s triple jump, to al­so clinch her coun­try’s maid­en medal at an Olympic Games and spark sim­i­lar eu­pho­ria in Roseau.

The his­toric achieve­ments by Al­fred and La Fond marked two of five medals for the Caribbean. Ja­maican Shanieka Rick­etts mea­sured a sea­son-best 14.87 to fin­ish with sil­ver in the triple jump; her team­mate Ra­jin­dra Camp­bell took bronze in the men’s shot put with a mark of 22.15 me­tres; and Grena­di­an Lin­don Vic­tor pulled out the stops to al­so clinch bronze in the men’s de­cathlon with 8711 points.

It was the mar­quee women’s 100 me­tres that first grabbed at­ten­tion, es­pe­cial­ly af­ter Al­fred fur­ther el­e­vat­ed her na­tion’s hopes of a medal by surg­ing in­to the fi­nal with a scin­til­lat­ing 10.84 clock­ing in the sec­ond semi­fi­nal, when she al­so beat Richard­son in­to sec­ond.

There was more to come, how­ev­er. Lin­ing up in lane six with Richard­son in sev­en, Al­fred, at her first ever Olympics, burst from the blocks to as­sert con­trol over the first 30 me­tres, with Swiss sprint­er Mu­jin­ga Kam­bund­ji al­so threat­en­ing from lane two but Richard­son strug­gling to stay with the leader.

The last 50 me­tres be­longed sole­ly to Al­fred, the for­mer Uni­ver­si­ty of Texas stand­out, pulling away im­pe­ri­ous­ly to cross the line with­out a se­ri­ous chal­lenger.

“It feels amaz­ing, to be hon­est. Af­ter wak­ing up this morn­ing, I wrote it down: Julien Al­fred, Olympic cham­pi­on,” Al­fred told re­porters.

“So I think just be­liev­ing in my­self and trust­ing that I could do it is what re­al­ly mat­ters to me.

“I’m go­ing through the mo­tions right now—it hasn’t sunk in yet. I had to go out there, trust my­self, trust my coach, and most im­por­tant­ly, trust God.”

Richard­son, the heavy pre-race favourite, clocked 10.87 to clinch sil­ver, while fel­low Amer­i­can Melis­sa Jef­fer­son round­ed out the podi­um with 10.92.

Teenaged Ja­maican Tia Clay­ton fin­ished one from last in 11.04.

St Lu­cia’s Prime Min­is­ter Philip J Pierre cel­e­brat­ed Al­fred’s achieve­ment, post­ing on his Face­book page: “To­day is a great day for OECS mem­ber states and the peo­ple of the Caribbean! In one day, Saint Lu­cia and Do­mini­ca will have cre­at­ed his­to­ry by win­ning our first Olympic medal and bring­ing home the gold. 

“Con­grat­u­la­tions to Saint Lu­cia’s very own Julien Al­fred for win­ning gold in the women’s 100m.”

There was ma­jor dis­ap­point­ment for vet­er­an 37-year-old sprint­er Shelly-Ann Fras­er-Pryce. The for­mer World and Olympic cham­pi­on was forced to with­draw from the semi­fi­nal due to in­jury.

La Fond, mean­while, pro­duced her win­ning leap on her sec­ond at­tempt, adding to her tri­umph at the World In­door Cham­pi­onships in Glas­gow ear­li­er this year while eras­ing the dis­ap­point­ment at last year’s World Cham­pi­onship in Bu­dapest when she fin­ished fifth.

Amer­i­can Jas­mine Moore mea­sured 14.67 to take bronze.

La Fond and Rick­etts, who af­ter­wards spoke of their close friend­ship, cel­e­brat­ed to­geth­er.

“This sea­son wasn’t easy, but we did it when it mat­tered, and that’s what counts,” La Fond said as she em­braced Rick­etts, who added, “All that mat­ters is what hap­pened tonight.”

Do­mini­ca’s Prime Min­is­ter, Roo­sevelt Sker­rit, was quick to con­grat­u­late La Fond on be­half of a grate­ful na­tion.

“Your out­stand­ing ac­com­plish­ment on the glob­al stage fills our na­tion with im­mense pride and joy,” he wrote on his Face­book page.

“We cel­e­brate your suc­cess and hope that your ded­i­ca­tion and per­se­ver­ance will in­spire fu­ture gen­er­a­tions of ath­letes in Do­mini­ca.

“Thank you for al­ways rep­re­sent­ing our coun­try with such grace and dig­ni­ty. Your tri­umph in Paris stands among our proud­est mo­ments as a na­tion.”

The 28-year-old Camp­bell grabbed his slice of his­to­ry when he be­came the first Ja­maican to medal in the shot put, pro­duc­ing the suc­cess­ful throw in the sec­ond round to move in­to sil­ver medal con­tention.

But Amer­i­can Joe Ko­vacs mea­sured 22.15 on his fi­nal at­tempt to take sil­ver, as fel­low coun­try­man Ryan Crouser clinched gold with a sea­son-best 22.90.

Vic­tor, 31, a bronze medal­list in Bu­dapest last year, fin­ished be­hind even­tu­al win­ners Markus Rooth of Nor­way (8796) and Leo Neuge­bauer of Ger­many (8748) to add to his Com­mon­wealth Games ti­tles.

The Caribbean will have the chance to add to their medal tal­ly on Sun­day af­ter the Ja­maican trio of Kis­hane Thomp­son, Oblique Seville, and Ac­k­eem Blake, along with Rikkoi Brath­waite of the British Vir­gin Is­lands, ad­vanced to the semi­fi­nals of the men’s 100 me­tres, set to be run off at 8.05 pm (2.05 pm East­ern Caribbean time).

The fi­nal is sched­uled for 9.50 pm. (CMC)