Barbados isn’t leaving another major athletics meet empty-handed.
Not under Kion Joseph’s watch.
The Pan Am Juniors bronze medallist has himself another major podium finish this year after placing third in the men’s 400m hurdles final of the Commonwealth Youth Games yesterday in the Isle of Man.
Running out of Lane 4 in the six-man final, the 17-year-old St Leonard’s schoolboy crossed the line in 53.52 seconds, finishing behind India’s gold medallist Durgesh Kumar (51.76) and Johannes Pretorius (53.05) of South Africa.
“I am very proud of him even though the time was below what we were looking for,” said Joseph’s coach Brian Holder.
“But sometimes you just have to go for the medal over the time, and that was the aim of the going, because he wasn’t just going for the trip.”
It was the second time in less than two months that Joseph had medalled at a major youth meet, as the promising hurdler had captured a bronze medal while posting a personal best in the same event at July’s Pan Am Junior Games in Florida.
But his streak of successive podium finishes looked in danger after Joseph advanced to the final with just the fifth fastest qualifying time of 54.56 seconds.
Earlier on the track, Jerrad Mason failed to advance to the men’s 800m final after finishing last of six competitors in the first heat of the semi-finals.
Mason (2:06.03) bettered his first-round time of two minutes, 8.01 seconds by near two full seconds but everyone else in the heat clocked sub-two-minute times to leave the Harrison College standout at the back of the pack.
Kenyan Timothy Kitum (1:49.32) won the event, with fellow countryman Leonard Kirwa Kosencha (1:50.62) and Botswana’s Nigel Amos (1:51.07) rounding out the top three positions to complete an African sweep.
In the pool, multi-CARIFTA Games gold medallist Zabrina Holder was just one of two Barbadian swimmers to advance to a final yesterday after placing sixth in the women’s 100m butterfly with a 1:02.51 clocking. New Zealand’s Sophia Batchelor won the event by posting 58.63.
Holder’s fellow female CARIFTA Games medallists Lee-Ann Rose and Amara Gibbs weren’t as fortunate, failing to get past the preliminaries of the 50m backstroke and 400m individual medley respectively.
Rose’s 31.45 clocking in the backstroke was the 11th fastest time of the prelims, while Gibbs was 13th overall in the IM after posting 5:08.89.
Matthew Courtis reached the final of the 200m butterfly but was a distant seventh in 2:14.15 in a race that New Zealand’s Alexander Hancock won with a 1:58.79 clocking Courtis had previously failed to get past the preliminaries of both the 200m IM (2:15.22) and the 400m freestyle (4:14.79) after posting the ninth and 11th fastest times in those respective events.
Junior national road race king Russell Elcock and Brandon Wilkie were 30th and 36th respectively in cycling’s criterium for men.
The Barbados contingent is scheduled to return home on Wednesday.
