This morn­ing, when I was told Sean Roach passed away, I replied, “Who, Sean Roach?”—even though I knew ex­act­ly which Sean Roach they meant. For what seemed like an eter­ni­ty, I kept re­peat­ing, “Nah! No! Nah man! You ly­ing!”

​At 46! I know life is short. Life is un­cer­tain; God knows best. But let me say it out loud: this news hurt, and it hurt hard.

When I was pres­i­dent of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Olympic Com­mit­tee (TTOC) and Sean Roach made an ap­point­ment to see me to dis­cuss as­sis­tance for a then-young Keshorn Wal­cott, Michelle-Lee Ahye, and oth­er ath­letes un­der his T&T Elite Ath­letes com­pa­ny, our re­la­tion­ship be­came in­cred­i­bly con­struc­tive and pos­i­tive.

I was al­ways as­sured of con­fi­den­tial­i­ty when­ev­er it was deemed nec­es­sary. He al­ways cham­pi­oned the cause of his ath­letes, whom he saw as more than pawns on a chess­board—he saw them as hu­man be­ings, as fam­i­ly. His con­fi­dence in the po­ten­tial and tal­ent of those he rep­re­sent­ed was un­wa­ver­ing. He tru­ly be­lieved in them.

Even though he was 20 years younger than I am, he was in “lit­tle broth­er” or “son” ter­ri­to­ry. There were days he would sim­ply make time to come to the then-TTOC Olympic Head­quar­ters at 121 Aber­crom­by Street, Port-of-Spain. Some­thing that res­onat­ed with me over the years was that when­ev­er I saw Sean and his fa­ther, they al­ways seemed to gen­uine­ly en­joy each oth­er’s com­pa­ny.

Sean al­ways gave off de­ter­mined vibes when it came to his pas­sion and, I dare say, his fa­ther’s lega­cy. I re­mem­ber Sean’s deep com­mit­ment to sus­tain­able growth and his fo­cus on tak­ing Langston Roach In­dus­tries in­to the fu­ture and in­to new mar­kets. Be­cause his fa­ther, Langston Roach, was some­one I ad­mired and re­spect­ed for many good rea­sons, I al­ways found my­self hav­ing a lot of time for Sean.

Sean had clear, vi­sion­ary ideas for youth and young peo­ple in par­tic­u­lar through the ve­hi­cle of sport. There was nev­er a day Sean came to me with a prob­lem for which he didn’t have a pro­posed so­lu­tion. He be­lieved in the pow­er of sport as a uni­ver­sal lan­guage. He sup­port­ed the TTOC in more ways than one, whether ad­ver­tis­ing in the TTOC qua­dren­ni­al col­lec­tors’ mag­a­zine or back­ing the con­cept of Go­ing4Gold. Even when he dis­agreed or had an is­sue—ei­ther of his own or on be­half of his ath­letes—I do not re­call a sin­gle mo­ment when Sean was dis­re­spect­ful, brash, or un­prin­ci­pled. Not one of us is an an­gel, and we all make mis­takes, but Sean al­ways ra­di­at­ed an en­er­gy that showed he was com­mit­ted to learn­ing and grow­ing.

Sean was what we col­lo­qui­al­ly call “a good one.” Even as I write this, I am still try­ing to wrap my head around his un­time­ly pass­ing. “Gone too soon” keeps play­ing on a loop in my mind. Sean’s loss is heavy, full stop. Across all his en­deav­ours—in busi­ness, sport, fam­i­ly, and as a con­fi­dant, friend, ad­vi­sor, men­tor, and role mod­el—his loss is heart­felt and pro­found. Sean Roach was an in­spi­ra­tion.

​Keshorn Wal­cott, Trinidad and To­ba­go’s his­to­ry-mak­ing 2012 Olympic javelin gold medal­list, said this: “No amount of prayers, no amount of pro­cess­ing will ever make me un­der­stand this.......I owe you my life bro. With­out you, there would be no Keshorn Wal­cott. Thank you for show­ing me the world is filled with great peo­ple, and you were the great­est of them all. Love you, my broth­er. RIP”

​In­deed, may Sean Roach rest in peace. My sin­cer­est con­do­lences go out to his fa­ther, Langston Roach, as well as his fam­i­ly, friends, col­leagues, and the staff at Langston Roach In­dus­tries. Sport in Trinidad and To­ba­go has lost a val­ued friend, a trust­ed col­league, and a broth­er.

​Gone too soon!