Shani­qua Bas­combe, the Na­tion­al As­so­ci­a­tion of Ath­let­ic Ad­min­is­tra­tions (NAAA) and T&T Olympic Com­mit­tee (TTOC) girls' ju­nior "Ath­lete of the Year", will aim to boost Cougars Track and Field Club as it seeks to de­fend its ti­tle at the Bar­ba­dos Re­lay Fair to­mor­row.

Bas­combe, who was al­so picked up the club's top se­nior award, as well as ju­nior award re­cip­i­ents Jani­ka Jor­dan and Jor­dan Noel are part of the con­tin­gent that leaves to­day for the in­ter­na­tion­al meet.

The "Green Ma­chine" as the club is fond­ly called is seen as one of the pre­mier track and field in­sti­tu­tions for de­vel­op­ment at the Ju­nior lev­el and has al­ready shown the ben­e­fit of their skill and in­struc­tion by win­ning the NAAA Ju­ve­nile Cham­pi­onships for the past sev­en years (2011, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18).

The Cougars club has been in ex­is­tence for the past nine years with sev­er­al of the young ath­letes al­ready se­cur­ing spots on Ju­nior Carif­ta and na­tion­al teams.

Last week­end, it held an in­ten­sive train­ing camp at the Hase­ly Craw­ford Sta­di­um in Mu­cu­rapo, fore­go­ing the Car­ni­val fes­tiv­i­ties, for a chance to whip their Bar­ba­di­an coun­ter­parts in the up­com­ing com­pe­ti­tion.

Head coach Kelvin Nan­coo says the club fo­cus is on de­vel­op­ing the whole ath­lete.

"This a good ven­ture for the club and its ath­letes. The ex­po­sure is need­ed and we seem set to stand up proud­ly on Sat­ur­day. I ex­pect af­ter the camp that we will do very well in Bar­ba­dos, if not win the cham­pi­onship again. Our ath­letes have done well and coach­es Abe­y­ola Akowe, Rawle Phillips and Ash­ton Gill are very hap­py with their prepa­ra­tion," said Nan­coo.

"All sys­tems are on go and with a good flight and some luck, we will do T&T proud. I wish to thank the Min­istry of Sport for en­sur­ing that our camp and our tour will be a very pro­duc­tive ex­pe­ri­ence. I wish to thank, the Na­tion­al Lot­ter­ies Con­trol Board (NL­CB) and First Cit­i­zens Bank for their role in en­sur­ing the suc­cess of our team."

Oth­er na­tion­al ath­letes that are par­tic­i­pat­ing in­clude Caliyah Wal­lace, Ethan Forde, Jor­van West­field, Michael Jack and Ka­res­sa Kir­ton. The club will be trav­el­ling with 65 ath­letes and four coach­es, a phys­io­ther­a­pist and four chap­er­ones.

"In ad­di­tion, we will al­so have 36 cheer­ing par­ents to en­sure we are very com­pet­i­tive at the Re­lay Fair," said Nan­coo. "Cougars is look­ing to mak­ing T&T proud once again."