The quartet of Lestrod Roland, Jason Rogers, Antoine Adams and Brijesh Lawrence clocked 38.41s in finishing sixth in their heat, thereby missing out on a birth in the final scheduled for tomorrow evening.  But their time eclipsed their previous best of 38.47s.  “I couldn’t ask them for any more,” Coach Lonzo Wilkinson said, “Because they gave better than their best and set a new record.”

The mood in the St. Kitts and Nevis camp at the Olympic Village in London had taken a definite upswing over the last three or four days Wilkinson said, as he commented on the team’s preparation for the semi-final event.  “It’s just amazing to see how the guys have pulled together within the last three or four days and really functioned as a unit, even as they competed for the four spots in the relay,” he said.  “In fact, on their own, the team devised and adopted a new Mantra, “One Team, One Sound! One Team, One Speed!  One Team, One Dream!”  The idea was the brain child of NACAC Under-23 sprint champion Jason Rogers, who said, “I just felt that we needed to move on from where we were and come up with something new.”

The team was rested from training on Thursday as the coaches concentrated on getting them both relaxed and focussed.  They had their work cut out for them though as team St. Kitts and Nevis was drawn in the tougher of two heats with the likes of Brazil, Jamaica and Great Britain and where they had the slowest 2012 performance of 39.06s.  They had to be at their best.

In the end they went six hundredths better than their best and in so doing broke the national record that had been set at the World Championships in 2011 with a team that had included sprint icon Kim Collins.  Maybe we didn’t get into the final but with this performance this team has shown that the dream is possible.