Women’s boxer, Chimere Taylor, missed a first ever medal for T&T among her gender at the 28th Pan American Games in Toronto, Canada yesterday when she was kayoed in her middleweight (69-75 kg) bout by Dominican Republic’s Yenebier Guillen Benitez. Fighting at the Oshawa Sports Centre, 27-year-old Taylor was trailing 30-27 on points when she was floored by her opponent with a minute and 20 seconds left in round two of their quarterfinal, with the winner certain of a bronze medal for the least.
In taekwondo, Central American and Caribbean Games bronze medal winner in 2010 and 2014, Dorian Alexander, 31, started well before losing to Colombian Miguel Trejos, 5-11 in their three-round battle, helped by four penalty points at the Mississauga Sports Centre.
Alexander, who fought at the 2009, 2011 and 2013 World Taekwondo Championships and is a medical doctor by profession, won the first round 2-1, but in the second round Trejos turned up the heat and outscored his T&T opponent 8-1 to take command of the contest, 9-3, before the second round played out 2-all on points.
At the Chevrolet Beach Volleyball Centre, Fabien Whitfield and Daneil William secured ninth spot via their default win over Venezuelans Jackson Henriques and Jesus Villafane. On Sunday night, cyclist Njisane Phillip failed to add to his silver medal in the Match Sprint when he ended fifth in the Men’s Keirin which was contested over eighth laps at the Cisco Milton Pan Am Veledrome.
In the morning heats, Phillip was second in heat two behind Canada’s Hugo Barrette while Argentina’s Leandro Battasso earned the other qualifying spot to the final ahead of USA’s Matt Baranoski. And in the other heat, Colombian Fabian Puerto won ahead of Venezuela’s Hersony Canelon and Suriname’s Jair Tjon En Fa, while Brazil’s Flavio Cipriano was fourth and did not advance.
However, in the six-man ride off for the gold medal, Phillip could only muster a fifth spot behind gold medal winner Puerta while Canelon took silver and Barrette, bronze. Bottasso was fourth while Tjon En Fa was sixth followed by Cipriano and Baranoski. At the Angus Glen Golf Club, the local quartet of Sachin Kumar, Talin Rajendranath, Christina Ferreira and Monifa completed tough campaigns.
Rajendranath carded rounds of 74, 78 75 and four over 74 for a total of +13 (301) and 24th, one spot above Kumar who had scores of 78, 76, 73 and 75 for a +14 (302) tally. Ferreira carded a final round of 82 (+10) to go with previous rounds of84, 85 and 79 a four-day total of 330 (+42) an 26th while Sealy ended four places higher after she shot a final round of 83 (+11) to add to previous scores of 81, 77 and 77 for a combined 318 (+30) and joint 22nd with Bolivian Natalia Soria.
And in the Mixed Event, the T&T quartet had rounds of 155, 153, 150 and 156 for +38 for 15th. At the Chevrolet Beach Volleyball Centre, T&T’s Ayana Dyette and Malika Davidson ended in 14th spot after going under to Guatemalans, Maria Jose Orellan and Blanca Recinos, 15-21, 16-21.
Today (Tuesday), at the CIBC Hamilton Pan Am Soccer Stadium, T&T men, beaten 4-0 by Uruguay and 5-1 by Paraguay tackle Mexico from 5.35pm while at the Pan Am Hockey Field, the national men’s team come up against the host country in their final quarterfinal from 7.30pm. So far swimmer George Bovell (50m freestyle bronze) and Phillip are the lone T&T athletes to medal at the games which steps into high gear this week with the start of the track and field events.