LOS ANGELES, California– A handful of English-speaking Caribbean athletes, including a current and a former world champion from Grenada, are carded for the sixth World Athletics Continental Tour Gold meeting of this season on Friday and Saturday in the United States.
Two-time men’s javelin world champion Anderson Peters, and former Olympic and world 400 meters champion Kirani James will be among the biggest talents set to showcase their fitness under the California sun during the USATF Los Angeles Grand Prix, which spans two days at Drake Stadium on the University of California, Los Angeles, campus.
Peters will bring his powerful 90-metre throws to the meet on Saturday, when he faces five challenges, all American, led by Curtis Thompson, whose personal best has been 87.70m.
None of the challengers to Peters has come close to hurling the spear anywhere near the 85.88m he has under his belt for the season, with Capers Williamson coming the closest with 79.95m.
Former Olympic and world 400 meters champion Kirani James from Grenada is one to watch in his pet event.
He opened his outdoor season in Botswana and took second place in 44.76 seconds and will be aiming to improve his most recent world championships medal from silver to gold this season.
Commonwealth Games champion Jereem Richards of Trinidad & Tobago will face Aaron Brown in the men’s 200m.
Richards, the world indoor 400m champion, will have to improve on his season’s best 20.40 secs because Brown showed out at the Botswana Golden Grand Prix in April, with a 20 secs flat performance to take the runner-up spot, and American hot shot Josephus Lyles is also in the line-up.
Kyron McMaster, who boasts the fastest personal best for the event and a British Virgin Islands national record with his 47.08 from the Olympics in Tokyo, will feature in the men’s 400m hurdles, where world bronze medalist Trevor Bassitt takes on a close competition against Khallifah Rosser, a finalist at the last worlds in American city of Eugene.
World bronze medalist Sada Williams of Barbados gears up for a women’s 400m rematch against world silver medalist Marileidy Paulino of the Dominican Republic.
Jamaican Fredrick Dacres, the 2019 world silver medalist, will be joined by compatriot and national champion Traves Smikle, who has yet to break the 70m mark, in the men’s discus, and compatriot Danniel Thomas-Dodd will be looking to crack the 20m mark and push women’s shot putt world champion Chase Ealey of the United States.
