The 45-ath­lete con­tin­gent, which racked up third-high­est medal count, in­clud­ing 10 gold, five sil­ver and sev­en bronze, at last week­end's Cen­tral Amer­i­ca and Caribbean (CAC) Ju­nior Track and Field Cham­pi­onships, in Mex­i­co, is ex­pect­ed to re­turn home to­day.

T&T ath­letes com­plet­ed the three-day com­pe­ti­tion with an im­proved gold medal haul com­pared to 2012's eight. Jonathan Far­in­ha and Aaliyah Teles­ford were both dou­ble-gold medal earn­ers, with the for­mer hav­ing won the Boys' Un­der-20 100m dash, be­fore lead­ing the 4x100m team to re­lay gold. Far­in­ha al­so placed sec­ond in the 200m event in 20.82 sec­onds, be­hind Zhar­nel Hugh­es, who broke the cham­pi­onship record in 20.33 sec­onds. Teles­ford sim­i­lar­ly won Girls' U-20 100m fi­nal be­fore she, Za­kiya De­noon, Kayelle Clarke and Ak­i­la Mc­Shine claimed the di­vi­sion's 4x100m re­lay ti­tle. On Sun­day, the fi­nal day of com­pe­ti­tion, Machel Ce­de­nio (45.28 sec­onds) suc­cess­ful­ly de­fend­ed his 400m ti­tle just three months af­ter he won gold at the Carif­ta Games in Mar­tinique. He was five-hun­dredths of a sec­ond off his na­tion­al ju­nior record break­ing run (45.23), which he clocked at the Cay­man In­vi­ta­tion­al, which was al­so a ju­nior world lead­ing time.

Shakeil Wait­he (javelin, 70.39m) was the oth­er gold medal win­ner in the Boys' U-20 di­vi­sion. Por­tious War­ren was the on­ly gold medal­ist in the Girls' Un­der-20 di­vi­sion. For T&T' Boys' U-18 team, And­wuelle Wright dom­i­nat­ed the long jump event as he al­so de­fend­ed his ti­tle with a 7.15m leap, an im­prove­ment from his 7.07m ef­fort two years ago.

That di­vi­sion al­so saw T&T pro­duce two re­lay teams earn gold. David Win­ches­ter, Akan­ni His­lop, Corey Stew­art and Xavier Mu­lu­ga­ta took the spot­light with their gold in the 4x100m re­lay, while Kobe John, Ter­ry Fred­er­ick, Ja­cob St Clair and Kashief King did the same in the U-18 4x400m. T&T's U-20 boys' 4x400m team, led by Far­in­ha and in­clud­ing Ohdel James, Asa Gue­vara and Bre­on Mullins won bronze with a 3:13.73 ef­fort. Gue­vara and Ce­de­nio were part of the U-18 team which won the 4x400m re­lay event at the last CAC Ju­nior Cham­pi­onships.

De­noon, who helped her team to re­lay glo­ry al­so fin­ished with two sil­ver medals from the girls's U-20 100m (11.47) and 200m (23.63) events. Clarke fin­ished be­hind her in the 200m, clock­ing 23.71m. Mc­Shine then claimed bronze in same di­vi­sion's 100m hur­dles in 14.05 sec­onds.

Among the boys' U-18 oth­er medal­ists, His­lop fin­ished third in both the 100m (10.63) and 200m (21.27) races, while Ian West amassed 5,888 points to take bronze in the de­cathlon. Not much sep­a­rat­ed West and Mex­i­co's Jafett Juarez, who broke the cham­pi­onship record with 5,945 points.

On­ly one sil­ver and one bronze came from T&T's U-18 girls, through Jem­i­nise Par­ris (13.70 sec­onds) and Chelsea James (16m), in the 100m hur­dles and shot put events, re­spec­tive­ly.

The ef­forts of T&T's ath­letes saw this coun­try fin­ish be­hind on­ly Mex­i­co (100 medals) and Ja­maica (42 medals), which sup­plied 147 and 54 ath­letes, re­spec­tive­ly. In to­tal, 85 events were con­test­ed. Fol­low­ing the re­turn of T&T's ath­letes, a num­ber of them will turn their fo­cus to the IAAF World Ju­nior Cham­pi­onships, in Ore­gon, USA, which runs from Ju­ly 22-27.

Re­sults:

Medals stand­ings

1 Mex­i­co 100 (36 gold, 43 sil­ver, 21 bronze)

2 Ja­maica 43 (15, 17, 11)

3 T&T 22 (10, 5, 7)

4 Ba­hamas 20 (7, 8, 5)

5 Puer­to Ri­co 20 (6, 5, 9)

Se­lect Re­sults

Boys Un­der-18

4x400m re­lay

1. T&T (Kobe John, Ter­ry Fred­er­ick, Ja­con St Clair, Kashief King), 3:13.93

2. Ba­hamas 3:14.70

3. Ja­maica 3:16.27

De­cathlon

1. Jafet Juarez (Mex­i­co) 5945

2. Jose Her­nan­dez (Puer­to Ri­co) 5912

3. Ian West (T&T) 5888

Boys Un­der-20

400m fi­nals

1. Machel Ce­de­nio (T&T), 45.28

2. Twayne Crooks (Ja­maica), 46.50

3. War­ren Hazel (St Kitts), 46.72

Javelin

1. Shakeil Wait­he (T&T), 70.39

2. Den­zel Prat (Ba­hamas), 66.18

3. Or­lan­do Thomas (Ja­maica), 63.89

110m hur­dles fi­nals (+1.0)

1. Mar­vin Williams (Ja­maica), 13.52

2. Reubin Wal­ters (T&T), 13.59

3. Ri­car­do Tor­res (Puer­to Ri­co), 13.76,

4. Aaron Lewis (T&T), 13.85

4x400m fi­nals

1. Ja­maica, 3:11.20

2. Puer­to Ri­co, 3:12.70

3. T&T (Ohdel James, Nathan Far­in­ha, Asa Guev­era, Bre­on Mullings), 3:13.73

De­cathlon

1. Fe­lipe Ruiz (Mex­i­co), 6440

2. Fran­ciso Ol­guin (Mex­i­co), 6244

3. Ronald Ramirez (Guatemala), 6072

4. Kevin Roberts (T&T), 5821

5. Vic­tor Isaac (T&T), 5694

Girls Un­der-20

Javelin

1. Dan­na Cor­ral (Mex­i­co), 42.78m

2. Ishe­ka Binns (Ja­maica), 42.21m

3. Yul­isha De la Rosa (Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic), 39.68m

4. Chuntal Mo­han (T&T), 38.89m?