Je­lani Beck­les

je­lani.beck­les@guardian.co.tt

Pres­i­dent of the T&T Olympic Com­mit­tee (TTOC) Bri­an Lewis was not in a race against the clock at the T&T In­ter­na­tion­al Marathon on Sun­day, but want­ed to raise aware­ness and fund­ing for the T&T Olympic ath­letes.

Lewis and the TTOC cre­at­ed the Ath­lete Wel­fare and Prepa­ra­tion Fund last year, a fund cre­at­ed to sup­port T&T's ath­letes. The fund is ex­pect­ed to pro­vide health and fi­nan­cial sup­port for Olympic, Par­a­lympic and Com­mon­wealth ath­letes. Dressed in na­tion­al colours, Lewis and a num­ber of sport of­fi­cials, so­ca artistes and ju­di­cia­ry mem­bers walked and ran the marathon in an ef­fort to con­tin­ue build­ing Olympic in­ter­est among the lo­cal com­mu­ni­ty. The ul­ti­mate goal of the TTOC is to win ten or more Olympic gold medals by the 2024 Olympic Games.

Among those who walked along­side Lewis were T&T Pro League CEO Dex­ter Skeene and sport jour­nal­ist/ra­dio show host An­dre Er­rol Bap­tiste. Oth­ers showed their sup­port by par­tic­i­pat­ing in the Marathon Re­lay. Par­tic­i­pat­ing in the Marathon Re­lay were a team of en­ter­tain­ers led by so­ca artiste Fay Ann Lyons-Al­varez, while Chief Jus­tice Ivor Archie and his fam­i­ly al­so com­pet­ed.

Af­ter the race, an ex­haust­ed Lewis thanked every­one for the sup­port. Lewis said, "It was nice to have the Chief Jus­tice and his fam­i­ly pulling for the TTOC ten or more Olympic medals by 2024 and Fay Ann Lyons. We had a lot of en­cour­age­ment out on the road. I knew that there are a lot of ex­pec­ta­tions for me to fin­ish."

Lewis, who cred­it­ed his med­ical team for help­ing him pre­pare for the race, said the jour­ney was dif­fi­cult but he kept the ath­letes in mind. "There was a point in the race I was strug­gling and I ques­tioned my­self why I was do­ing this. At that point I was frus­trat­ed, I thought is this worth it. But I re­mem­bered the ath­letes and this is to raise aware­ness and fund­ing."

Chief Jus­tice Archie, who com­plet­ed the last of four legs with his fam­i­ly said T&T must sup­port the na­tion's ath­letes. Archie said, "I got in­volved be­cause I re­al­ly think it is im­por­tant to sup­port our ath­letes. We can't all be Olympic ath­letes but we can all em­u­late the ded­i­ca­tion, the com­mit­ment and dis­ci­pline that is in­volved in com­pet­ing at that lev­el." Archie said ath­letes need moral and tan­gi­ble sup­port and hopes the rest of T&T will sup­port tan­gi­bly to the cause. "The in­vest­ment in sport is a way of get­ting rid of crime."

Archie said he ran and walked from San Juan to the end of the race at White Hall around the Queen's Park Sa­van­nah in Port-of-Spain.