Malaki Smith competes in a track meet earlier this year. He recently won two medals at the CAC Age Group Chmpionships in Trinidad. Photo: DEAN GREENAWAY

Last weekend, Malaki Smith returned from the Central American and Caribbean Age Group Championships in Trinidad with silver and bronze medals, while several other Virgin Islands athletes had top-five finishes in the two-day competition.

Malaki Smith competes in a track meet earlier this year. He recently won two medals at the CAC Age Group Chmpionships in Trinidad. Photo: DEAN GREENAWAY
Mr. Smith dipped under the 2009 record of 7.80 seconds set by Mario Burke, of Barbados, in the 11-12 boys 60-metre dash with a time of 7.71 seconds, but had to settle for silver after Jamaica’s Terrique Stennett lowered the mark to 7.59 seconds in the first event of the competition.

Aside from track and field, Mr. Smith is guard on the basketball team Swaggers, who he helped to victory in the Roger A. Hodge Summer Basketball League after scoring 18 points while training for the CAC Age Group competition. He climbed from 14th place to just two points behind third overall after a 53.88-metre baseball throw to earn a bronze medal, to end the first day of the competition.

He would finish 13th overall in the pentathlon with 2,831 points as the top VI athlete in the division.

Sha’el Lavacia was 19th with 2,601 points. The event featured the 60-metres dash, long jump, high jump, baseball throw and the 100 metres.

In the final event of the 13-14 girls heptathlon on Sunday afternoon, the VI’s Tashara Edwards, who was fourth behind the US Virgin Islands’ Mikaela Smith, who won the gold medal, placed seventh overall in 3:27.66 minutes to win 499 of her 3,490 points to end the competition in 14th place. She also competed in the 80 metres, long jump, shot put, 60-metre hurdles, baseball throw and the high jump.

Mr. Smith won the first heat in the two-and-a-half lap race that had a combined 27 participants in 3 minutes and 16.01 seconds to earn 573 points. He finished 17th overall with a cumulative score of 3,387 points.

Xiomara “Gia” Malone ran 3:54.72 minutes for 19th overall, but had the best finish of the VI athletes in 12th place with 3,553 points. Her performances included three top 10 finishes in the 80 metres, long jump and the high jump where she finished fifth.

Ariyah Smith was fifth in the 11-12 girls pentathlon long jump with a personal best of 4.40 metres. She was  in a three-way tie for second in the high jump, which also had a four-way tie for first. She finished 14th with 2,305 points.

Teammate Alisha Hayde placed 21st with 1,723 as she came up with no marks in the high jump after failing to clear the bar, then narrowly missed an 800-metre bronze medal in the final event after a personal best effort of two minutes and 39.62 seconds.

Like the boys, they contested the 60 metres, long jump, high jump, baseball throw and ran the 800 metres instead of the 1,000 metres.

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