“There is no bigger stage in the world for athletes than the Olympic stage. And BVI has been attending Olympic Games for the last 44 years.
The Games started about 3,000 years ago in Ancient Greece. Athletes competed bare feet and nude and both the competitors and the audience were male.
Women joined in 1900 and, since then, a lot about the games and attire has changed.
With a single exception, the 2024 quartet to the Paris Olympic Games on behalf of the BVI (IVB) were all male.
Thad Lettsome competed in the men’s ILCA7 dinghy (laser). On the day he sailed in race 4 and arrived in second place at the finish line, all BVI was in a frenzy.
The Minister with responsibility for Sports and the hierarchy of the BVI Olympic Committee were visiting Marseille where the sailing was taking place.
They dignified the celebrations with their presence.
France’s Minister of the Sea greeted and congratulated Thad as did all his competitors.
Rikkoi Brathwaite made us proud when he qualified in position 3 of heat one of the 100m dash. He is one of the fastest 60m runners alive but that is not yet an Olympic sport.
In his semifinal race, he ended up giving way to the likes of Noah Lyles who won the gold medal in the final although he was not the first to cross the finish line.
Stranger things have happened.
Simply put, Adaejah Hodge is a sensation and at 18, the youngest member of the BVI Team and the lone female. She has a long and bright future as an Olympian.
When she ran her semifinal heat having qualified in heat one, she finished a mere 3/4 of a second behind the #1 qualifier but it was not enough to see her to the final.
Adaejah already has a list of accolades to her name that can only get longer with the passage of time.
But it was always going to be on the shoulders of Kyron McMaster OBE, in the now popular 400m hurdles that BVI would press for its first medal at the Games.
At least 70,000 souls, twice the population of the Territory, were in the spectator stands when the semifinal heats for the 400m hurdles were run.
BVI was proud to see Kyron, although nursing an injury, cruise his way to a first-place win in his heat.
When he ran the finals this afternoon with many residents of the Territory glued to TV screens, some at watch parties, a pin could have been heard dropping even in the sage mountain rain forest at its lofty height of 1780 feet above sea level.
As McMaster approached the start line, the heart of the Territory swelled with pride. Then we held our breath.
We exhaled 46.76s later when it was clear that an American [formerly ran for Antigua] ran away with the gold. McMaster was 1.5 seconds behind him, but others intervened and squeezed the silver and bronze medals from his hands.
We applauded him, nonetheless, and are proud to be associated with him.
Our athletes demonstrated that they are world class. But they need support.
We know that the Territory is rife with demands on a dwindling treasury, but we believe that if the government is sincere when it says ‘the youth are the Territory’s future’ then the right investments will be made.
We saw our Minister for Education demonstrating this resolve during the graduation exercises when she gave the top two students from every secondary school a monetary reward to help them with their tertiary academic pursuits.
She should be commended.
And we saw it again, at the eleventh hour, with support to the athletes. But they need consistency and predictability.
We know that better can and will be done for the will of the people is evident, in this regard.
Fridays call upon all residents of the Territory to raise a glass and give three cheers for our Olympians.
May they continue to grow stronger, faster, better.
Happy Friday!”