Triathlon schools champs coming

ELECTED UNOPPOSED on October 30, new Jamaica Triathlon Association president, Carl Sharpe, is bent on raising his sport’s profile and increasing participation.

With that in mind, Sharpe’s administration is planning to launch a schools’ championship soon. Allied to that in Sharpe’s plan for the future is the introduction of triathlon relays.

According to Sharpe, the schools’ championship will change the way Jamaica picks its team for the annual Carifta Triathlon.

“What we plan to do is we will be having a school championship next year to choose our squads for the Carifta. Originally we just based it on those who were interested in the sport and those who brought their children,” he explained. “But we think we have found some momentum that we’re going to go further with.”

That upcoming event is in the planning stages, but it may well include relays.

“We figure that each school, or a lot of schools, even if they can’t find a triathlete, or even a duathlete, they can find somebody who can swim, another person who can ride and another person who can run and make a team, and we intend to do that to generate more interest in the sport,” he professed.

Triathletes compete in races combining running, swimming and cycling, while duathletes specialise in running and cycling.

The association’s focus on youngsters drew a parallel with Flora Duffy, Bermuda’s Olympic women’s triathlon champion.

“Flora Duffy is not an overnight success. She actually had been practising triathlon since she was a child and she has really reached her peak now,” Sharpe explained.

“Really, so proud of her, really, but it’s not a case of her just emerging just yesterday or anything like that.”

Thanks to Duffy, Bermuda became the smallest country ever to win a gold medal in Tokyo in July.

The triathlon association’s president also plans to deepen cooperation with his colleague presidents in the local swimming and cycling federations.

“Yes, we actually work in tandem with them. As a matter of fact, most of our triathletes and aquathletes, most of our athletes right now are aquathletes who just swim and run and most of them have actually graduated from the swim clubs,” he revealed.

“In actual fact, so we do collaborate with them and you have some new ones coming on stream shortly and will be trying their skill at our National Championships coming up,” he said of the event set for Port Royal on November 20.

He also encouraged participation in the Escape Triathlon, which is set for Sunday in Ocho Rios.