THE NINTH IAAF/Coca Cola World Junior Championships are over and Jamaicans should be proud. It was a great meet, the Jamaican athletes were brilliant, and so too the Jamaican administrators.
The showpiece of the world's top junior athletes, the championships have been held in Athens, Greece; Sudbury, Canada; Plodiv, Bulgaria; Seoul, South Korea; Lisbon, Portugal; Sydney, Australia; Annecy, France; and Santiago, Chile. And the consensus is that this one has been the best.
Based on the words of IAAF president Lamine Diack himself, Kingston 2002 was not only the best of all the championships as far as organisation, attendance and atmosphere were concerned, but it was so good that Jamaica deserved another gold medal for a job well done.
"This is the best, the most successful World Junior Championships ever," said Diack. That is high praise, and he uttered those words before the touching and dazzling closing ceremony. That is one reason why Jamaicans should be proud.
Another reason is that the country's athletes were outstanding to the point where in winning two gold medals, five silver medals and four bronze medals they pocketed a record 11 medals; and still another is that with all the events running on time, everything went like clockwork from start to finish.
Kingston 2002 was more than a showpiece for Jamaica's athletics, however. Because of the pall of crime in the country it was also a great opportunity to polish the national image; and that is one more reason why Jamaicans should be proud.
Apart from putting on a great show, the Jamaicans, particularly the over 30,000 who packed into the National Stadium on Sunday, were great hosts. They were on their best behaviour - even during the euphoria that followed the magnificent gold medal run by the girls 4 x 100 metres relay team.
So once again sport has inspired the best of Jamaica. It has happened before, most notably with the unforgettable journey of the Reggae Boyz on the Road to France in the 1998 run-up to the football World Cup Finals.
For those who could not find a place in the Stadium Sunday night the aerial television shot of the jam-packed amphitheatre was an awesome image of superb achievement to record for the ages.
