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• Commonwealth champion Sada Williams to headline Barbados National Championships

  Two-time World Championship bronze medalist and Commonwealth Games gold medallist Sada Williams headlines a star-studded list of Barbados’s top athletes set to compete at their National Track and Field Championships from June 21-23.

  Williams, who trains at the MVP Track Club in Jamaica under the tutelage of Stephen Francis, is her country’s biggest medal hopeful for the upcoming Paris Olympic Games having already qualified.

  The 26-year-old will contest the women’s 400m event at the Usain Bolt Sports Complex in Bridgetown.

  The Bajan national record holder has, so far, had a sub-par 2024 season by her lofty standards, failing to dip below 50 seconds in all five of her 400m races.

  Her season’s best 50.71 came at the Oslo Diamond League on May 30.

  Williams created history at 2022 World Athletics Championships in Oregon by winning 400m bronze in a then-personal best and national record 49.75 seconds.

  Later that year, Williams became the first woman to run under 50 seconds at the Commonwealth Games with 49.90 to capture gold. She closed out 2022 with a third-place finish at the Diamond League Final in Zurich in 49.98.

  She followed up that fantastic season with another bronze medal at the 2023 World Championships in Budapest.

  Williams produced a personal best and national record 49.58 in the semi-finals before returning to run slightly slower in the final, 49.60, to claim consecutive bronze medals.

  Also confirmed for the Barbados nationals are Olympians Mario Burke and Tristan Evelyn who are expected to contest the men’s and women’s 100m events respectively.

  Burke, 27, has a personal best of 9.98 done back in 2019 and was an Olympian in Tokyo in 2021. In 2016, he took home 100m bronze at the World Junior Championships in Poland in 10.26. He has a season's best of 10.22 done at the Last Chance Sprint Series on June 7 in Sherman Oakes, California.

  Hurdlers Tia-Adana Belle and Rasheeme Griffith are also among the big names, along with quarter miler Desean Boyce and former CARIFTA sprinters Julian Forde and Kishawna Niles.

  Griffith, a senior at the University on Tennessee, established a new 400m hurdles national record of 48.79 in the heats at the SEC Championships on May 9.

  CARIFTA Games gold medalist Layla Haynes and Hannah Connell as well as national javelin record holder Kayla Thorpe are also set to compete.

   

• McLeod, Ricketts secure victories at Paavo Nurmi Games in Finland

  National 110m hurdles record holder Omar McLeod continued his resurgence this season with a winning effort at the Paavo Nurmi Games, a Word Athletics Continental Tour-Gold event in Turku, Finland on Tuesday.

  The 2016 Olympic and 2017 World champion produced a season’s best 13.25 to win the final of the men’s sprint hurdles ahead of Belgium’s Elie Bacari (13.38) and Finland’s Elmo Lakka (13.43).

  The 30-year-old earlier ran 13.29 to advance fastest from the heats.

  The women’s sprint hurdles saw World Championships silver medallist Britany Anderson produce a season’s best 12.87 for sixth in the final after running 12.93 earlier in the heats.

  The final was won by American World champion Nia Ali in 12.48 just ahead of Dutchwoman Nadine Visser (12.51). Ireland’s Sarah Lavin was third in 12.66.

  This was McLeod’s third win in four events this season, with his previous two coming in Italy on May 15 and 19 with times of 13.37 and 13.47 at the Savona International Meeting and Lucca International Meeting, respectively.

  Elsewhere, two-time World Championships triple jump silver medallist Shanieka Ricketts took the win in the women’s triple jump with a best jump of 14.17m coming in the first round of the competition.

  Italy’s Dariya Derkach was second with 14.08m while Sweden’s Maja Askag was third with 14.06m.

  Two-time World champion Anderson Peters threw 82.58m for fourth in the javelin throw behind India’s Neeraj Chopra (85.97m) and the Finnish pair of Toni Keranen (84.19m) and Oliver Helander (83.96m).

• Cuban-born Jordan Diaz Fortun produces third-longest triple jump in history to win gold at European Championships

  Cuban-born Spanish triple jumper Jordan Diaz Fortun produced a spectacular performance to win triple jump gold on day five at the European Championships in Rome on Tuesday.

  The 23-year-old, who switched allegiance from Cuba to Spain in November 2022, produced a championship record and world-leading 18.18m to take gold ahead of Portugal’s Pedro Pablo Pichardo and France’s Thomas Gogois.

  Diaz Fortun led the competition after the first round with a 17.56m jump before Pichardo, who also switched allegiance from Cuba in 2017, produced the world’s first 18m jump since 2021 with 18.04m to take the lead in the second round.

  The Spaniard’s next two efforts were 17.82m in the second round and 17.96m in the fourth round after a third-round foul, finding himself just short of Pichardo’s mark heading into round five.

  In that fifth round, he produced what is now the third-longest triple jump of all time with a breathtaking 18.18m, only trailing Christian Taylor’s 18.21m and Jonathan Edwards’s world record 18.29m.

  Diaz Fortun’s jump also established a new European Championship record, eclipsing Edwards’s 17.99m set back in 1998.

  Pichardo’s next three best jumps after his monstrous 18.04m in round two were 17.55m in round three, 17.47m in round five and 17.92m in round six.

  Gogois produced a personal best 17.38m in the sixth round to secure the bronze medal.