This coun­try's full con­tin­gent of ath­letes for the 28th edi­tion of the Carif­ta Swim­ming Cham­pi­onship will be­gin de­par­ture to­day for Kingston, Ja­maica.

The T&T ath­letes will be par­tic­i­pat­ing in swim­ming, wa­ter po­lo and the in­au­gur­al open wa­ter com­pe­ti­tion.

The wa­ter po­lo del­e­ga­tion leaves to­day while swim­ming's del­e­ga­tion de­parts on Fri­day.

Speak­ing ahead of the team's de­par­ture, swim team man­ag­er, Neal Mar­cano says that he is whol­ly con­fi­dent of the team's prospects as they have strengths from both lo­cal­ly and for­eign-based swim­mers in all of the age-groups in­clud­ing mul­ti­ple event A qual­i­fiers Han­nah Chat­field and Kael Yorke, debu­tantes in the 11-12 age-group.

USA-based duo, Dy­lan Carter and Ty­la Mar­tin will spear­head this coun­try's ti­tle hopes from Fri­day-April 4 and good sup­port is ex­pect­ed from World Ju­nior Swim­ming Cham­pi­onship qual­i­fiers Kristin Julien and Joshua Ro­many as well as Jabari Bap­tiste.

Among the top seed­ed lo­cals in par­tic­u­lar events are debu­tant Jeron Thomp­son, in the 11-12 boys 100m but­ter­fly fol­lowed by team-mate Kael Yorke.

Mar­tin is the top 15-17 Girls qual­i­fi­er in the same event and al­so in the 200m but­ter­fly and 400m freestyle, while Carter and Joshua Ro­many are one-two in the 100m but­ter­fly as well as in the 15-17 boys 200m freestyle.

Adri­an Goin (13-14) and Yorke (11-12) are al­so at the top of the stand­ings in the 50m but­ter­fly as is Ro­many in the 15-17 50m but­ter­fly, 100m freestyle and 400m freestyle while Jonathan Ramkissoon is at the top in the 50m breast­stroke.

Ariel Cape, a 2012 Caribbean Is­lands Swim­ming Cham­pi­onship (CISC) sil­ver medal­ist is ex­pect­ed to best that per­for­mance as she goes in as the top qual­i­fi­er in the Girls 200m back­stroke event.

The re­lay teams com­mand the top spots in the 15-17 boys 400m freestyle, 400m in­di­vid­ual med­ley, 800m freestyle and 200m freestyle.

Join­ing the team af­ter lo­cal open wa­ter qual­i­fi­ca­tions are Ji­van Chee Foon, Sachin Sankar, both in the 15-17 age-group, Tere­sa Otero, Sha­nia David (13-14 Girls), and Kyle Carac­ci­o­lo and Chris­t­ian Mars­den (13-14 Boys).

The pair of 15-17 Girls Theana Hay and Syr­i­ah David will al­so swim in the open wa­ter event in ad­di­tion to their oth­er swim­ming events.

Ac­cord­ing to Mar­cano, re­gion­al com­pe­ti­tion is not un­known to al­most all of these swim­mers and many of them have shown their worth at the Good­will lev­el in­clud­ing first-time Carif­ta en­trants Ja­da Chai, Vrist­nelit Fau­re, Maris­sa Pack­ette, Yorke, Thomp­son, Kyle Sir­ju and Cana­da-based Goin.

Oth­er over­seas-based swim­mers in­clude, Emiro Goossen (USA), Alexan­dria Don­ahue (USA), UK-based Han­nah Chat­field and CISC medal­ist Re­bec­ca Mar­shall.

Ed­mund Pouchet, head coach, is al­so con­fi­dent in his team and looks for­ward to a suc­cess­ful meet, ably as­sist­ed by Hazel Haynes, Bri­an Wick­ham, two-time Olympian Sharn­telle Mc Clean, and Vin­cent Tardieu.

The T&T del­e­ga­tion al­so has ref­er­ees se­lect­ed and ap­point­ed by Carif­ta's ad­min­is­tra­tion to of­fi­ci­ate at its 2013 in­stal­ment of the cham­pi­onships. Swim­ming will be rep­re­sent­ed by FI­NA-ap­proved ref­er­ees Lind­say Gillette and Fran­cis Samp­son. Kester Scant­er­bury will ref­er­ee in the wa­ter po­lo com­pe­ti­tion.

Team

Swim­mers

11-12:

Girls: Ja­da Chai, Vrist­nelit Fau­re, Jessie Changar, Han­nah Chat­field, Mia Otero, Maris­sa Pack­ette.

Boys: Rha­jeev Ramdeen, Kyle Sir­ju, Jeron Thomp­son, Kael Yorke, Mark An­tho­ny Beck­les

13-14:

Girls: Ariel Cape, Jew­el Mul­rain, Ami­ra Pil­grim

Boys: Aaron Acres, Adri­an Goin, Derelle Prescott, Revash Ram­ta­hal, Os­aze Ri­ley, Justin Sam­lals­ingh

15-17:

Girls: Syr­i­ah David, Alexan­dria Don­ahue, Theana Hay, Kristin Julien, Re­bec­ca Mar­shall, Ty­la Mar­tin

Boys: Jabari Bap­tiste, Dy­lan Carter, Jonathan Gillette, Emiro Goossen, David Mc Leod, Jeron O'Brien

Jonathan Ramkissoon, Joshua Ro­many

Tech­ni­cal team: Ed­mund Pouchet (head coach), Hazel Haynes (as­sis­tant coach), Vin­cent Tardieu (as­sis­tant coach), Bri­an Wick­ham (as­sis­tant coach), Sharn­telle Mc Lean (as­sis­tant coach), Rox­anne Mar­cano (chap­er­one), Natasha Ly­der-George (chap­er­one), Ja­son Wick­ham (chap­er­one), Neal Mar­cano (man­ag­er), Kevin Mc In­tyre (mas­sage ther­a­pist), Na­dine Sam­my (psy­chol­o­gist).

Wa­ter Po­lo

Adam Alex­is, Joseph Her­rera, David West, Kryz­tien Sharpe, Mas­si­m­il­iano Di Co­la, Kiev Al­leyne, Kee­gan Forde, Liam Smith, Keanan Charles, Luke Gillette, Ethan El­liott, Liam How­ell, An­drew Gillette, Shel­don Bhan­wanie (man­ag­er), Alan Too-A-Foo (coach)