Aug 12, 2009
Top Jamaican Athletes Dropped From World Championships Team
In what seems to be the finale in an on-going dispute over training camp attendance, Jamaica has reportedly dropped six of the island’s top athletes from its team 2009 IAAF World Championships team.
The six are:
- Asafa Powell, a former 100-meter world-record holder
- Shelly-Ann Fraser, 2008 Olympic 100M champion
- Melaine Walker, 2008 Olympic 400M champion
- Brigitte Foster-Hylton, a hurdler
- Shericka Williams, a sprinter
- Kaliese Spence, a 400M runner
All six are members of the MVP track club and have been odds with Jamaica’s athletics federation recently over their non-attendance at the Jamaican team’s official pre-games training camp in Nuremberg. Earlier this week, Jamaican Amateur Athletic Association (JAAA) president Howard Aris had warned the athletes that they would miss the World Championships unless they appear at the team’s training camp.
There has long been ‘bad blood’ between the executives of MVP track club and the JAAA, as just last year there was controversy associated with Jamaica’s participation in the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, China, as athletes from the MVP club arrived late for a pre-Olympic training camp in Tianjin, China. The MVP track club has insisted that the JAAA’s camp is not up to scratch and interferes with its athletes’ preparations for the games. The JAAA meanwhile has maintained that all athletes must attend these camps.