T&T swim­mers be­gan their de­par­ture for this week­end’s start of the 37th Carif­ta Swim­ming Cham­pi­onships on Monday en route to the Ba­hamas via Ja­maica.

This year’s four-day meet will be held at the Bet­ty Kel­ly- Ken­ning Aquat­ic Cen­tre in Nas­sau, Ba­hamas from Sat­ur­day, March 30 to Tues­day, April 2.

Among the T&T 37-mem­ber team who will com­pete in the Ba­hamas are Olympic Games swim­mers, Dy­lan Carter, 28, and Cherelle Thomp­son, 31.

How­ev­er, while the duo will be pre­sent­ed with medals for their top three plac­ings in 50m and 100m races at the four-day com­pe­ti­tion, their points won will not be al­lowed to con­tribute to­wards their team’s over­all medal or points tal­ly as the events will be con­sid­ered ex­hi­bi­tion swims.

Last month, Carter se­cured two gold medals, and one sil­ver in the first In­ter­na­tion­al Co­pa Quere­taro, in Mex­i­co.

The San­ta Clara, Cal­i­for­nia-born Carter was sec­ond in the men’s 50m but­ter­fly in 23.68 with 44-year-old Brazil­ian world record hold­er Nicholas San­tos win­ning in 23.47 sec­onds.

How­ev­er, Carter end­ed on a high when he won the 50m freestyle in 22.34 sec­onds and al­so won the 100m freestyle in 50.00 sec­onds flat.

In Jan­u­ary at the FI­NA Aquat­ics World Cham­pi­onship, Carter was fifth in the 50m but­ter­fly af­ter a clocked 23.17 sec­onds in the fi­nal fol­low­ing times of 23.16 and 23.15 in the pre­lim­i­nary heats and semi­fi­nal re­spec­tive­ly, while he placed 15th in the 100m freestyle semi­fi­nal in 22.01 af­ter a time of 21.95 in the heats.

Thomp­son al­so com­pet­ed at the FI­NA meet and placed 38th in the women’s freestyle in 26.03, and 41st in the 50m but­ter­fly and al­so re­cent­ly com­pet­ed at the TYR Pro Swim Se­ries in Illi­nois, win­ning the women’s 50m freestyle C-fi­nal in 25.69 af­ter a time of 26.39 in the heats.

No­table ab­sen­tees for the T&T swim­ming con­tin­gent will be the USA-based duo of world ju­nior 50m freestyle cham­pi­on Nikoli Black­man who now at­tends the Uni­ver­si­ty of Ten­nessee, and Zarek Wil­son, now at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Al­aba­ma due to school com­mit­ments as the Carif­ta meet clash­es with the NCAA Di­vi­sion I Men’s Swim­ming and Div­ing Cham­pi­onships which be­gins to­mor­row (Wednes­day) at the In­di­ana Uni­ver­si­ty Nata­to­ri­um in In­di­ana,

Last year, T&T led by Black­man, a three-time Com­mon­wealth Youth Games gold medal win­ner, Wil­son who al­so won three medals at the CYG and USA-based duo of Liam Car­ring­ton and Liam Roberts sparked T&T to a third-placed fin­ish at the 36th Caribbean Free Trade As­so­ci­a­tion Aquat­ics (Carif­ta) Cham­pi­onships at the Enith Brig­itha Swim­ming Pool of the Cen­tro De­porti­vo Ko­r­sou in Cu­ra­cao.

The lo­cal swim­mers un­der the guid­ance of head coach Pouchet, and his ex­pe­ri­enced as­sis­tants, Paul Newal­lo, and Anil Roberts, the for­mer Min­is­ter of Sports tal­lied 54 medals (22 gold, 16 sil­ver, and 16) for 534 points to fin­ish be­hind de­fend­ing cham­pi­ons the Ba­hamas who cap­tured 85 medals (37 gold, 27 sil­ver, and 21 bronze) for 1,113 points, while Cay­man Is­lands fin­ished in the sec­ond spot with 53 medals l (25 gold, 16 sil­ver, and 12 bronze) for 752 points.

In the Ba­hamas Liam Car­ring­ton, Liam Roberts, An­pherne Bernard, Aaron Siewlal, and Dar­ren Bel­fon will be the main medal hope­fuls among the boys while Aimee Le Blanc, Zara Per­si­co, Ty­la Ho-A-Shu and Amari Ash will spear­head the medal hunt among the girls.

T&T Carif­ta swim team

Girls

11–12: Zara Per­si­co, Ma­ri­na Mar­tinez, Tay­lor Marchan, Za­lay­har Lewis

13–14: Asia-Marie Pouchet, Aimee Le Blanc, Alyssa Reid

15–17: Zuri Fer­gu­son, Ty­la Ho A Shu, Ly­la Browne, Amari Ash, Amelia Ra­jack, Syd­ney Look Fong, Keira Au­dain

18 & Over: Cherelle Thomp­son, Or­nel­la Walk­er, Gabrielle Vick­les, Zoe An­tho­ny

Boys

11–12: Ethan McMil­lan-Cole

13–14: Jaden Mills, Jonathan Sam­bra­no, Aaron Colthrust, Ale­jan­dro Agard, Aaron Siewlal, Joshua Sam­bra­no

15–17: Liam Car­ring­ton, Dar­ren Bel­fon, Zachary An­tho­ny, Liam Roberts, An­pherne Bernard, Evan Gillard Bruce, Isa­iah Alexan­der

18 & Over: Dy­lan Carter, Aqeel Joseph, Chris­t­ian Awah, Jo­hann-Matthew Mata­moro, Rique­lio Joseph

Team of­fi­cials: Mark Pouchet (head coach), Anil Roberts (as­sis­tant coach), Deronn Sam­lals­ingh (as­sis­tant coach), Paul Newal­lo (as­sis­tant coach), Kei­th Mata­moro (man­ag­er), Si­mone Sam­bra­no (chap­er­one), Lilas Solomon-Stu­art (chap­er­one).

Open Wa­ter team

Girls

14–15: Aimee Le Blanc

16 –18: Amelia Ra­jack

Boys

14–15: Mar­cus Alexan­der, Adam Scoon, Ale­jan­dro Agard

16–18: Zachary An­tho­ny, Isi­ah Alexan­der, Khadeem Brath­waite

Team of­fi­cials: Mau­rice Faria (head coach), Lilas Solomon-Stu­art (man­ag­er/chap­er­one)