The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

SOME top 10 performances were posted and personal best times achieved by athletes from the Red-Line Athletics, Swift Athletics and Star Trackers Track Club as they participated in the 28th annual Kentucky High School Indoor Track & Field Meet over the weekend in Lexington, Kentucky.

This was the second indoor meet this season for the Red-Line Athletics, who took nine athletes and produced 12 individual personal records, six top eight finishes, including a third and fourth place finish in the girls and boys 400 metres respectively.

Highlighting the performances at the Nutter Fieldhouse from the athletes competing from the Bahamas was Swift Athletics’ Carlos Brown Jr, who sped to second place in the boys’ 60 metres in 6.82 seconds. Corey Royster won the event in 6.79.

Brown Jr had the second fastest qualifying time of 6.93. Red-Line Athletics’ Sean Marshall just missed the cut when he finished 19th overall in 7.23. The top 18 competitors advanced. The final spot went to Kobi Mensah in 7.20.

Brown Jr was also third in the 200m in 21.96. Will Sumner of Woodstock Track Club won in 21.58. Red-Line Athletics’ Shimar Bain was sixth in 22.00; Jaydin Plakaris was eighth in 22.19 and Sean Marshall was 19th in 22.75.

The top performance on the girls’ side came from Lacarthea Cooper of the Red-Line Athletics, who picked up a third place finish in the 400m in 56.53.

Sidney Green of Allen High School won in 55.52. Nya Wright came in sixth in 58.15, Kennedi Knowles was 21st in 1:00.52, Aari- Aja Barnett of Swift Athletics was 38th in 1:06.34 and Shanai Sweeting of Red-Line Athletics followed in 39th in 1:06.36.

In the girls’ 200m, Cooper was fourth in 24.99.

Amari Pratt of the Star Trackers Track was eighth in 25.44, Nya Wright of the Red-Line Athletics was ninth in 25.48.

Kennedi Knowles of the Red-Line Athletics was 26th in 26.55 and Aari-Aja Barnett of Swift Athletics was 46th in 28.67. In the boys’ 400m, Jaydin Plakaris of Red-Line Athletics was fourth in 49.12. Will Sumner of Woodstock TC won in 46.7.

Shimar Bain of Red- Line Athletics was eighth in 49.92 and Leonardo Johnson of Red-Line Athletics was 39th in 56.40. Star Trackers’ Amari Pratt placed sixth in the girls’ 60m in 7.71. Autumn Wilson of Leander Spartans won the event in 7.35, surpassing the previous two winning times of 7.36 by Killebrew Semira in 2019 and 7.41 by Anthaya Charlton in 2020. She had the sixth fastest qualifying time of 7.77.

In the girls 60m hurdles, Shanai Sweeting of the Red-Line Athletics just missed advancing with a 19th place in 9.70.

The 18th and final spot was 9.69 by Jayda Watson of the Motor City Track Club.

On the field, Zaria Stapleton of the Star Trackers Track Club was ninth in the girls’ long jump with a leap of 4.94m 16-feet, 2 1/2- inches or 4.94 metres on her third attempt.

Amari Pratt was 11th with 15-11 (4.85m) on her first attempt. Evie Culbreath of Kindersport won with 18-01 (5.51m) on her second attempt.

Reanno Todd of the Star Trackers Track Club was 12th in the boys’ long jump with 5.78m 18-11 3/4 (5.78m) on his second attempt.

Jaden Stevenson of Greeneville Track Club did 22-04 ¼ (6.81m) on his fourth and final jump.

Todd was also fifth in the boys’ triple jump with 41-3 3/4 (12.59m) on his second jump.

Javon Adams of Lafayette popped 44-07 (13.59m) on his second jump to secure the win.

Following their performances in the Texas A&M Indoor High School Track Meet in February, Red-Line Athletics’ head coach Tito Moss said he was pleased with the performances they got in Kentucky. “The meet was a phenomenal meet,” Moss said.

“As the season heads into CARIFTA, the club is expecting to have six to eight athletes, who we feel have a really good chance of qualifying and making that team.

“In addition to that, our focus is also to get our 12 seniors off to college and a number of them have some very positive feedback that they are getting from colleges. We have about six of them pretty much sorted out, so we just want to lock up scholarship funding for the remainder.”

During the summer, Moss said they will put their attention on the younger athletes as they compete in the AAU meets before they close out the year with some of their athletes qualifying for the World Under-20 Championships in Cali, Colombia.

With the Bahamas Government starting to loosen up the COVID- 19 restrictions, Moss said they will also prepare to reschedule their Red-Line Athletics track meet for May, which had to be postponed in January. But Moss said they intend to continue to make the international trips to compete in meets like the Texas A&M and Kentucky High School track and field meets to provide them with the opportunity to compete against the high level of competition in the United States.