North American, Central American, and Caribbean Athletics Association (NACAC) President Mike Sands says while he is pleased with the region’s achievement at the Paris Olympic Games this summer, the work for the next Summer Olympics should begin immediately.

NACAC, made up of 31 member confederations, had 36 total territories (including associate members) competing in athletics at the Paris Games this summer. The region had 330 athletes competing in a 50-50 gender split in their events. These nations had a total of 52 medals consisting of 21 gold, 16 silver, and 15 bronze.

Of these, Jamaica finished with six (one gold, three silver, two bronze). While Jamaica is disappointed at its performance in the track events, four of its six medals came from throwers and jumpers, with Roje Stona claiming the country’s first-ever Olympic men’s discus medal – gold – with an Olympic record throw of 70m. Wayne Pinnock (men’s long jump, silver), Shanieka Ricketts (women’s triple jump, silver; and Rajindra Campbell (Jamaica’s first-ever Olympic men’s shot put medal, bronze) were the other field athletes to medal. Kishane Thompson took silver for Jamaica in the men’s 100m event and Rasheed Broadbell claimed a bronze in the men’s 110m hurdles.

There were also historic first medals for Dominica and St Lucia with Thea Lafond, in the women’s triple jump, and Julian Alfred in the women’s 100m won gold medals.

Sands is proud of this achievement.

“I think our athletes performed strongly well,” he told the
Jamaica Observer. “It’s great that the smaller nations like Dominica and St Lucia also stepped up to the plate and have their historical performances on the world stage. It bodes well for the future of the sport. It distributes medals, which makes it more competitive across the board. It’s no longer being dominated by what we sometimes refer to as the big teams. I’m very happy when I see the smaller member federations holding their own.”

With the next Olympic Games being staged in Los Angeles, a city in NACAC’s jurisdiction, Sands says the Caribbean region should make the most of this opportunity. He wants greater coordination by each territory to foster growth among the less developed ones.

“We have to sit down with the NOCs (National Olympic Committees) and CANOC (Caribbean Association of National Olympic Committees), and have a think tank of many strong minds in terms of how we proceed in the spirit of cooperation,” Sands said. “There are a lot of lessons to be learned from Paris. We shouldn’t wait until a few weeks before [the LA Games] — we should do it in very very short order. Then we can set the timelines to measure the progress that we are moving towards. How do we improve, not necessarily just the athletic performances because those will come, but also the administrative performances of the various associations?

“So, we have to do a full post-mortem as we prepare ourselves.”

With LA 2028, four years away, it means there will be many newer athletes trying to establish themselves as stars in athletics, and the opportunity for each territory to produce higher-level younger talent.

That, Sands says, makes various athletics competitions across the region such as the Carifta Games more important. But one criticism of these Games is that it tends to be dominated by Jamaica through its yearly medal tally. With the nation usually finishing with tens of medals more than its nearest rival on the table, there are questions about how to provide more parity.

Sands says, though, that medals should not be the priority.

“We put a lot of focus on medals, especially gold medals and I’m not so sure how fair that is to silver medallists,” he said. “If you consider a points system, Jamaica would still come out on top. How we bridge the gap is by supporting the smaller federations in building their programmes.

“Jamaica cannot be faulted for the level they have dominated. I think it’s admirable, but I also believe that we must find a way to bridge the gap. To do this, we have to do more kids’ athletics programmes.”

But Sands says there are NACAC programmes already underway addressing youth development and coaching education.

“From the NACAC area perspective, as we speak, there’s a clinic going on in St Vincent and we plan to have something in The Bahamas very shortly in terms of coaching education,” he said. “We’re taking the bull by the horns and being very aggressive in NACAC.”

Sands is a former Bahamian sprinter, who was the Central American and Caribbean Games 400m champion in 1975, and also the Pan American Games 200m bronze medallist that year.