Machel Ce­de­nio and Keshorn Wal­cott were the most out­stand­ing ju­niors at the re­cent Sagi­cor/NGC Na­tion­al Open Track and Field Cham­pi­onships. Ce­de­nio, a 17-year-old Pre­sen­ta­tion Col­lege stu­dent, ran bril­liant­ly to take fifth spot in the men's 400m fi­nals in 46.02, a new na­tion­al Un­der-18 record. He smashed the 46.40 mark of World Cham­pi­onships bronze medal­list Ren­ny Quow set back in 2004. The lanky sprint­er had won his heat ear­li­er in the day in 46.50, an im­prove­ment on his pre­vi­ous best of 46.68 set two weeks ear­li­er at the Na­tion­al Ju­nior Cham­pi­onships. The 2011 Carif­ta boy's Un­der-17 200/400m gold medal­list is the top Youth (Un­der-18) quar­ter­mil­er in the world. His 46.02 tim­ing is tenth on the World Ju­nior (Un­der-20) list­ing.

Ce­de­nio had an­chored the na­tion­al ju­nior 4x400m team to a world lead­ing ju­nior time of 3:05.95, with a scorch­ing an­chor leg to run down and past the Na­tion­al B team an­chor Stan Wait­he in the last 50 me­tres. The quar­tet, which in­clud­ed 17-year-olds Asa Guev­era (47.28) and Theon Lewis (48.53) and hur­dler Bran­don Ben­jamin (47.31) is al­most three sec­onds ahead of the next quick­est team on the World Ju­nior rank­ings, Poland (3:08.81). The quar­tet will be fur­ther bol­stered with the in­clu­sion of Jereem Richards, who has a per­son­al best of 46.79. The squad fin­ished third be­hind the men's na­tion­al team, which won in na­tion­al mark of 3:00.45, and Venezuela (3:04.05). Wal­cott took the men's javelin with a throw of 75.00 ahead of a youth­ful field. Tak­ing sec­ond was 17-year-old Shakeil Wait­he (51.46) with 16-year-old Pre­cious George (51.24) and 18-year-old Andwele Ko­rede (46.19) fol­low­ing be­hind. Wal­cott was short of his Olympic qual­i­fy­ing per­for­mance of 80.11 set in Cu­ba in May, his best throw on lo­cal soil (78.94) at the Quan­tum Clas­sic in May and his Carif­ta record of 77.59.

His mark of 80.11 puts him at the top of the Ju­nior (Un­der-20) men javelin rank­ings. In the men's shot put, sil­ver medal­list Hezekiel Romeo got the iron ball out to 16.72m, over the 16.30 World Ju­nior stan­dard with the 7.26kg shot. Mark Lon­don lost his men's 800m ti­tle, fin­ish­ing third, but was re­ward­ed with a per­son­al best and world ju­nior time of 1:50.54. The World Ju­nior men's 4x100m team was third in 40.18 sec­onds. In the men's 400m hur­dles Bran­don Ben­jamin and Reubin Wal­ters were quick­er the World ju­nior stan­dard of 53.34 with Ben­jamin tak­ing third in 52.13 and Wal­ters fourth one sec­ond slow­er (53.13). Among the women, Ker­ne­sha Spann low­ered her 400m per­son­al best to 54.35 in fin­ish­ing fourth in the "A" fi­nals of the open event. Spann was al­so fourth in the one lap hur­dles fi­nals in 1:00.40 get­ting past the World Ju­nior stan­dard of 1:00.75 for yet an­oth­er time this sea­son.

Rank­ings

Ju­niors (U-20)

Men

Javelin

Pl Time Ath­lete (s)

1 80.11 Keshorn Wal­cott

4x400m

1 3:05.95 T&T Ju­niors (Asa Guev­era, Bran­don Ben­jamin, Theon Lewis, Machel Ce­de­nio)

400m

10 46.02 Machel Ce­de­nio

200m

20 20.82(+0.6) Jereem Richards

Youth (U-18)

100m

6 10.50(-1.5) Jon­a­han Far­in­ha

200m

3 21.19(-1.2) Jonathan Far­in­ha

4 21.23(+1.0) Machel Ce­de­nio

400m

1 46.02 Machel Ce­de­nio

4 47.28 Asa Gue­vara

110m hur­dles (91.4cm)

3 13.68(-1.4) Reubin Wal­ters

400m hur­dles (84.0cm)

9 53.30 Reubin Wal­ters