World Track and Field bronze medal win­ners, To­bag­o­ni­ans Ren­ny Quow and Josanne Lu­cas were named Sports Per­son­al­i­ties of 2009 at the an­nu­al Guardian Sports Desk awards cer­e­mo­ny on Wednes­day. The Sports Desk al­so ho­n­oured for­mer na­tion­al foot­ball cap­tain Dwight Yorke who re­tired from in­ter­na­tion­al com­pe­ti­tion ear­li­er this year, Daren Gan­ga for his ex­em­plary lead­er­ship skills at the IPL se­ries in In­dia, Alvin Corneal for his years of ser­vice to T&T sport and Rudy Rag­bir, a for­mer sports writer at the Guardian for more than 30 years. Both are away at Uni­ver­si­ty but Quow's broth­er, Roger, and his dad Ru­pert, were both on hand to col­lect his award. Speak­ing on be­half of his broth­er, Roger said Ren­ny was de­light­ed to re­ceive the ho­n­our and pledged to con­tin­ue win­ning more races for T&T.

The 22-year-old Quow won the men's 400 me­tres ti­tle at the Na­tion­al Cham­pi­onships in Ju­ly in 44.91 sec­onds. He then set a per­son­al best in the 400m (44.53 sec­onds) in the semi­fi­nal round of the World Cham­pi­onships in Berlin, Ger­many, the sec­ond fastest time in 2009 and the sec­ond fastest in T&T his­to­ry be­fore he earned a bronze medal in the fi­nal in 45.02 sec­onds. The medal es­tab­lished Quow as the first T&T quar­ter-mil­er in the 26-year his­to­ry of the cham­pi­onships to se­cure a podi­um fin­ish. Over­all, Quow end­ed 2009 sec­ond in the 400m World Ath­let­ic tour with 72 points, in­clud­ing sev­en top three fin­ish­es and four sub 45 clock­ings. The 25-year-old Lu­cas sat a new per­son­al best time in 100 me­tres hur­dles (12.99) in Tal­la­has­see, Flori­da, Unit­ed States in May be­fore set­ting a new na­tion­al record in the 400m hur­dles (55.24) at the Grande Pr�mio Brasil Caixa meet in Bel�m, Brazil that same month.

In Ju­ly, she won dou­ble gold (100m hur­dles and 400m hur­dles) at the Na­tion­al Cham­pi­onships and a month lat­er, be­came the first fe­male ath­lete to medal at a se­nior glob­al meet when she got bronze in the 400 me­tres hur­dles bronze in 53.20 sec­onds (a new na­tion­al record) at the World Cham­pi­onships. It was the third fastest time of the year and the 17th fastest of all time. In pay­ing trib­ute to the pair, as­sis­tant sports ed­i­tor Kei­th Clement de­scribed the per­for­mances as top of the line and urged the pair to con­tin­ue aim­ing for the stars. Yorke is al­so out of the coun­try but his T&T man­ag­er Tim Nafziger de­scribed him as a phe­nom­e­nal ath­lete who not on­ly dis­tin­guished him­self but helped to put his coun­try on the map. Corneal, for­mer na­tion­al crick­eter and foot­baller who went on to serve foot­ball in sev­er­al ca­pac­i­ties and is now a Fi­fa tech­ni­cal ad­vis­er, ex­pressed de­light at the recog­ni­tion. Rag­bir was rep­re­sent­ed by his wife, Vil­ma. A trib­ute was paid to him by Fi­fa vice pres­i­dent Jack Warn­er, who de­scribed his con­tri­bu­tion to sports jour­nal­ism as out­stand­ing and urged young sports writ­ers to em­u­late what he did.

SPORTS DESK AWARDS

Lead­er­ship Award - Daren Gan­ga

Out­stand­ing Con­tri­bu­tion to T&T Sport - Dwight Yorke

Life­time award for ser­vice to sport - Alvin Corneal

Sports­man on the Year - Ren­ny Quow

Sports­woman of the Year - Joanne Lu­cas

Out­stand­ing Con­tri­bu­tion to Sports Jour­nal­ism - Rudy Rag­bir