Kirani James (File Photo) - Wins World Juniors silver over 400m in Poland for Grenada

BYDGOSZCZ, Poland, CMC - Grenada's outstanding young quarter-miler Kirani James won silver in the 400 metres in a national junior record 45.70 seconds at the 12th IAAF World Junior Championship on Thursday evening.
 
The 15-year-old James, also a World Youth silver medallist in Ostrava last year, finished 0.17 seconds behind the American upset winner Marcus Boyd.
 
Racing in lane seven, the gifted James chopped a considerable 0.83 seconds off his previous best -- of 46.53 -- done in the preliminaries as he chased Boyd to the finish.
 
Despite running far out in lane eight, Boyd, who is a training partner of Olympic champion Jeremy Wariner, took nearly half a second off his personal to run a junior world leading 45.53 seconds.
 
The favourite O'Neal Wilder, of the USA, finished third in 45.76 seconds.
 
Wilder, who had beaten Boyd at the US junior trials for this event, had previously been the quickest in the world.
 
Boyd's win meant the 400-metre title goes back to the United States after they had won the men’s one-lap event on five of the nine previous occasions before Trinidad and Tobago's Renny Quow took gold in 2006.
 
Meanwhile, the English-speaking Caribbean has remarkably placed four athletes into the women's 200-metre final, including Wednesday's 100-metre finalists Sheniqua Ferguson, of the Bahamas, and Meritzer Williams, of St Kitts and Nevis.
 
Williams won semi-final heat one in 23.77 chased by Jamaican Jura Levy (23.92) as the Caribbean pair moved into the gold medal race. Barbadian Sade Greene was seventh in 24.32.
 
Grenada's Janelle Redhead clocked a personal best 23.47 and Ferguson (23.49) to deliver another Caribbean one-two finish in heat three. Jamaican Trisha-Ann Hawthorne did not start the event.
 
Bahamian Nivea Smith, a World Youth bronze medallist in Ostrava last year, had a disappointing run in heat two and exited with a 23.84 clocking for fifth place.
 
In the men's 200 semis, powerful Jamaican Nickel Ashmeade won his heat in 20.83 seconds and is the only Caribbean runner through to the men's final.
 
His teammate Ramone McKenzie, the reigning World Youth champion over the distance, laboured to eighth in semi-final three in 21.60 seconds, three places behind Trinidad and Tobago's Jovon Toppin (21.45).
 
In the first round of the 200 earlier, Ferguson, who picked up the 100-metre bronze on Wednesday, had dominated the seventh and final women's heat for a winning time of 23.74 seconds.
 
Williams, after placing seventh in the 100-metre final on Wednesday, clocked 23.64 in heat three to be the fastest of the morning.
 
Redhead clocked 23.66 to win the first heat and there were other preliminary round victories for the Caribbean as Smith took heat five in 23.67 and Levy won the sixth heat in 23.82.
 
Hawthorne (24.12) and Greene (24.10) also did well enough to advance.
 
The Kittitian Tameka Williams (24.55), the US Virgin Islands' Allison Peter (24.61), Barbadian Tameka Rawlins (24.66), and Trinidad and Tobago's Nyoka Giles (24.58) were eliminated.
 
Ashmeade had logged the morning's quickest time in the men's 200 first round. The 2007 World Youth 100-metre silver and 200 bronze medallist in Ostrava stopped the clock in heat five in 20.86 seconds.
 
McKenzie had easily advanced at 21.55 seconds before his evening disappointment, and Toppin (21.56) also stepped into the next round.
 
Cayman's Kemar Hyman (21.81), T&T's Zwade Edwards (22.11), and Barbadian Shekeim Greaves (21.81) failed to get past the first round.
 
In the 100-metre hurdles heats, Bahamian Krystal Bodie won heat five in 13.66 seconds.
 
Jamaicans Shermaine Williams (13.38) and Natasha Ruddock (13.73) also advanced.
 
Williams was one of the quickest in the heats, only Alina Talai, of Belarus, who won heat four ahead of her in 13.34, went faster.
 
CARIFTA Games champion Kierre Beckles, of Barbados, is also through.
 
Beckles, the CARIFTA Austin Sealy Award winner as Most Outstanding Performer in St Kitts four months ago, clocked 13.95 seconds for fourth in her heat.
 
Another CARIFTA champion Janeil Bellille, of Trinidad and Tobago, secured a spot in the final of the women's 400-metre finals along with Jamaican Nikita Tracey.
 
Bellille (57.54) and Tracey (57.84) placed second and third respectively in the first semi-final that Britain's Meghan Beesley won in 57.24 seconds.
 
Jamaican Shana-Gaye Tracey raced in semi-final two and did not finish.
 
No CARICOM runner made the men's 400-hurdles final, as T&T's Jehue Gordon (52.26) and Emmanuel Mayers (52.39), Barbadian Shane Brathwaite (53.09) and the USVI's Leslie Murray (52.51) struggled in the semis.
 
In the field, T&T's Kyron Blaise (15.17m) failed to advance in the men's triple jump

CMC lw/08