The sprint trio of Richard Thompson, Marc Burns and Darrel Brown, as well as top swimmer George Bovell III, the lone T&T medallist in Athens four years ago, are the headliners among Trinidad and Tobago's 30-member Olympic team.
The T&T team list is dominated by athletics, with 25 track and field competitors making the cut. The other five are Bovell III, his young brother Nicholas Bovell and Sharntelle Mc Lean (swimming), Roger Daniel (shooting) and Dexter St Louis (table tennis).
The Trinidad and Tobago Olympic Committee (T&TOC), following a meeting last evening at the Jean Pierre Complex, named the official squad, which has 20 officials, including seven medical personnel, a manager in Wendel Labastide and Michael Valentine as chef-de-mission.
T&TOC president Larry Romany hailed this year's team as T&T's best ever, in terms of preparation.
"We have athletes who have done extremely well, not just once or twice, but consistently in the last few months," he explained.
Although the world leading times this year in the men's 100 metres have been extremely impressive, including a new world record of 9.72 seconds by Jamaica's Usain Bolt and an even faster, but wind-assisted, 9.68 by Tyson Gay at the US trials, Romany is confident the T&T sprinters can give a very good account of themselves.
"What we have seen is that these (low) times have not been coming up through the rounds. People have been coming up through the rounds at (around) 9.8 (seconds), and we think we have athletes who can do that," Romany explained.
Although the T&TOC chief is being "realistic" about T&T's chances of a huge medal haul at Beijing 2008, he feels that athletes who have met the required standards should be given a fair chance to show their improvement.
"If we were looking at sending athletes only for medals," he pointed out, "then we'd only send two, or three. This is a chance to show how they have improved, and where these athletes are "
Also on the T&T Olympic team are former world junior champions Renny Quow (400 metres) and Rhonda Watkins (long jump), top female sprinter Kelly-Ann Baptiste and throwers Cleopatra Borel-Brown (shot put) and Candice Scott (hammer throw).
T&T should have a strong showing in the men's 4x100m relay, with Keston Bledman, Emmanuel Callender and Aaron Armstrong joining Brown, Burns and Thompson on the squad. Baptiste will team up with Semoy Hackett, Sasha Springer-Jones, Wanda Hutson, Monique Cabral and Ayanna Hutchinson for the women's sprint relay.
