Congratulations
At the start of the ongoing Paris Olympics, there were sixty five countries in the world that had never won an Olympic medal of any description. It is pleasing to note that that number has been reduced to sixty three by two Caribbean women. Saint Lucia's Julien Alfred came first in the women's 100 metres final with a time of 10.72 seconds. She went on to claim a silver medal in the women's 200 metres final. At the age of twenty three she is destined to become a heroine in her small island nation for the rest of her life and good luck to her! Just a hundred miles north of Dominica is another island nation - Dominica. This is where thirty year old Thea LaFond was born though she emigrated to the USA with her family when she was a small girl. She now lives in Maryland. Last Saturday, in the final of the Women's Triple Jump, she achieved a "personal best" distance of 15.02 metres and a gold medal for Dominica. As I say, it was her birth country's first ...