Nicholas Paul remains the “sprint king” of the Pan American region.
He confirmed it again after defending his men’s sprint title and captured T&T’s first gold medal at Santiago 2023 at the Velodrome in Penalolen, Chileon Thursday.
“A next gold medal at the Pan American Games to be able to defend my title and to be the two-time Pan Am sprint champion, I’m just happy with this performance,” said a smiling Paul after the medal ceremony.
Paul’s strategy also remains unmatched as no other rider could outsprint him.
“I just prepare as best as possible and come out here and put my best foot forward and represent T&T, my family, my friends, all my supporters to the best of my ability and I came out and I did it so I am really happy,” added Paul,
Called “Super” by the announcer as he rode out onto the track, the 25-year-old, whether starting on or off the rail, superbly slayed the first ride and returned later to do it again and swept the best of three-ride final against Surinamese Jair Tjon En Fa to reach the top of the podium, once again.
The defending champion grabbed the spotlight early in the competition, clocking a blistering 9.574 seconds to break the previous Pan Am record of 9.808 seconds which belonged to him achieved in Lima 2019 in Peru on Wednesday in the qualification round.
About his achievement he said, “I mean it feels great again to come back to Chile, a Pan American Games again, to be able to get the Pan American Games record and start off the sprint competition good so I mean I was feeling great to be able to come out and do that. I’m very happy.
“Yeah, it’s always a great pleasure to come out to the Pan American Games to compete in front of great crowds and especially to compete here in Chile where there is a great track I must say. I’m happy.
“I like the track. It’s not too steep, it’s not too slippery, I love that kind of terrain.”
The track seems to love him also.
Earlier yesterday, in the morning session, it was a stroll at the Penalolen Park for Paul in heat one of the semifinals as he swept Colombian Kevin Quintero, 2-0, in their best of three rides to book his spot in the final.
Tjon En Fa, needed a deciding third ride in semifinal heat two, to get into the gold medal and the Surinamese rider went on to upstage Canada’s Nicholas Wammes. The Canadian rode hard to win the first round but his strategy failed him in the next two rides as was unable to catch up with Tjon En Fa, the third-best rider from Wednesday’s qualification round.
Wammes and Quintero, the second and fifth-best riders respectively in the qualifying stage, battled for the bronze and it was the latter succeeding in two rides.
En route to the final, Paul eased past Juan Carlos Ruiz of Mexico in heat one of the 1/8 Finals and then cruised against Cristian Ortega of Colombia, sweeping him in the best of three rides.
T&T’s Kwesi Browne also competed in the men’s sprint event but he was eliminated in the repechage, the day before. This after falling in the 1/8 Finals and losing against Wammes. He then was ousted after finishing second in the repechage behind Ortega.
T&T’s first medal at Santiago 2023, a bronze, came courtesy of the men’s 3x3 basketball team of twin brothers Ahkeel and Ahkeem Boyd, Moriba De Freitas and Chike Augustine, on Monday.
The quartet, coached and managed by Christopher Jackson Charles, defeated Venezuela, 21-20 at the Spanish Stadium in the Las Condes region,
Paul will be the lone T&T cyclist back on the track today, chasing success in the keirin event. The qualification round starts at 9.13 am T&T time.
“Just have to go reset and come again in the morning to finish it off. Hopefully, all goes well I get a next medal,” said the men’s sprint gold medallist.
Alexi Costa-Ramirez just missed out on a medal in the women’s omnium, placing fourth.
The T&T endurance rider made a great start to the four-round event, topping the opening scratch race to earn a maximum of 40 points. The objective of the race is to be first over the finish line after a certain number of laps and after seven, Costa-Ramirez timed her breakaway to perfection.
She rode away to finish ahead of Caribbean neighbour Amber Joseph of Barbados, who stayed on for second and American Colleen Gulick crossed third.
Next up was the Tempo Race and in that round, she finished down the order in tenth place and scored 22 points.
Taking the second round was Chile’s Catalina Soto earning 27 points, Lina Marcela Hernandez of Colombia (10) was second, and Venezuelan Veronica Abreu (4).
Heading into her next ride in the evening session, the elimination race, she was in seventh place with 62 points. She added 28 more points for her seventh-place finish in the third round to go to 90 points and up to fifth spot in the rankings.
In the final round, the points race, she took her total to 115 to end in fourth spot behind gold medallist Yareli Acevedo of Mexico with 128, silver medallist Colombian Lina Hernandez (121), and bronze medallist Soto (120).
USA blast T&T women 15-zip
T&T women’s hockey team was shown no mercy by the United States in their opening match at the Hockey Centre in Santiago, yesterday.
Sanne Caarls scored three goals while Linnea Gonzales, Abigail Tamer, and Ashley Hoffman each found the back of the net twice as the local “Stickwomen” suffered a crushing 15-0 defeat in the second lopsided match of the day. Earlier, Argentina beat Uruguay, 8-0.
From the very first minute of the match, USA was on the attack. Gonzales opened the account for the Americans, scoring a field goal in the second minute. Some nine minutes later, Danielle Grega put the US team up 2-0 and the score remained unchanged at the end of the first quarter.
It was a high-scoring second quarter for the Americans, who kept up the attack and pushed the pace and were rewarded in the 22nd minute off a penalty corner from Hoffman. Next, Gonzales scored her second item and her team’s fourth goal in the 25th. Soon after, Madeleine Zimmer made it 5-0 in the 27th. Then came two goals in a minute, the 28th, from Meredith Sholder and Caarls, who scored back-to-back field goals. Her other item came in the 29th minute for the US, adding six more goals to their lead. The Americans did not let T&T score a single goal in the first half, ending the session, 8-0.
“The positives that we’re going to take out of this is that we still defended quite well but it just unfortunate that they had so much firepower going forward that they were able to score so many goals,” said coach Akim Toussaint after the match.
“The ranking that we are compared to the USA, it’s quite a big margin so they would not have expected to lose by that much but we weren’t expecting much from the game.
“What we wanted to do is to work on our structure and just come out nice and strong against them.”
The T&T unit did a much better job defensively on the resumption, holding its opponent to two goals, and penalty-corner items from Tamer (41st) and Elizabeth Yeager (45th) to close the third quarter.
Unfortunately, the local “Stickwomen” could not maintain that resistance in the final quarter. There was no holding back the Americans as they added five more to their tally, with Tamer (47th), and Hoffman (47th) doubling up and Caarls (59th) netting her third while Ashley Sessa and Leah Crouse each scored one. 55th and 56th minute of the one-sided match.
The local women’s hockey players walked off a dejected bunch but they will only have a day to shake off the loss as they face the Uruguayans tomorrow, while the men’s team, who also lost to the USA in its opener on Wednesday, will play Brazil today at 8.30 am (T&T time).
For the next match, the game plan is, according to Toussaint: “Work on that defensive structure, make sure we don’t give up as many goals as this one, and look forward to more of the crossover games.”
He added, “This is a tournament that is more of a development for us. We’re not looking at victory so much but more development and how we can hold structure well.”
