Six qualify for Caribbean Games

Jun 02, 2009 Sports

Greene, Fortune still to meet standards

Rawle Greene

Alisha Fortune

Colin Boyce

By Edison Jefford
Six athletes have so far qualified for the inaugural Caribbean Games in Trinidad and Tobago from July 12-19, but the other local prospects, Rawle Greene and Alisha Fortune, are yet to meet the stringent qualification standards.
President of the Athletics Association of Guyana (AAG), Colin Boyce told Kaieteur Sport that he is aware of six athletes that are safely within the prerequisite criterion that the Caribbean Games’ Committee had set for prospective athletes.
“So far we just have six athletes that have qualified,” Boyce stated yesterday, adding that some countries are attempting to negotiate with the Organising Committee to regulate the current qualifying times to facilitate more entries.

The thinking behind the move to change the existing standards is to increase participation from athletes in the region. However, that move may oppose the conception of the Games that was created as a platform for leading athletes.
“They [the organisers] are considering lowering the standards and extending the deadline, but of course that is just hearsay, we are awaiting confirmation,” Boyce said, adding that the move will benefit some local prospects.
The entry deadline is set at midnight on June 11 and every other major qualification meet for locally-based athletes is after then. For instance, the South American Senior contest is to be held from June 19-21 in Peru. There is also the Caribbean and Central America Senior Championships, July 3-5 but that will definitely be too close to the Caribbean Games. “We have to be on safe grounds and make the qualification times,” Boyce posited.

Time is definitely running out on Guyana’s senior sprint champions, Greene and Fortune. They will both welcome a positive decision on the adjustment of the qualifying standards but that could psychologically affect them.
There are athletes in the region that have comfortably made the respective times, which is the primary reason for the balance in the adjustment argument. Greene and Fortune could be affected on the basis of wildcard entries.
Wildcards usually have no hope of getting out of the first round of the competition, which fundamentally questions their presence at the event. “Greene and Fortune are not close to qualifying they are way off,” Boyce concluded.