I read an interesting article by Franklin Johnston, published in the Jamaica Observer on Friday, April 21, 2017, titled ‘We have outgrown Carifta Games’, suggesting that because of Jamaica’s domination of the Carifta Games the country should be transformed, abandoned, or Jamaica should exit gracefully.

Jamaica has indeed dominated the Games, but that does not warrant any of the prescriptions advanced by the writer. Every national team would like to be a winner — as do all athletics teams — but it’s a little different with athletics competitors.

Athletics is basically an individual sport, rather than a team sport, like football or cricket. Quality of performance is most important for athletics competitors: “I did a pr” (personal record), or “I did a great time”, or “I threw a long distance.” Of course, that does not negate the feeling of nationalism.

Nationalism has always prevailed between countries in Olympic sports. That was clearly visible during the cold war when political leaders linked the production of great sportsmen with ideology. It was after the World War II Olympic Games that the points system arose and the residual effect persists.

Athletics competitors and teams never feel they have been bullied or brutalised. Certainly, however, they would like to improve for the next encounter.

Here are some comments of teams returning home after the last Carifta Games: A Bermudan minister whose team finished last on the medal table congratulated the team for representing Bermuda well, while the coach praised the team for exceeding their expectations. The Kittitian team enjoyed meeting new friends and their Olympic head praised their high jumper who won gold. In fact, the Olympic chief declared: “A gold medal in Carifta Games means you are placed in the same league as people like Usain Bolt…”

Travel, camaraderie, pride in representing one’s nation, achieving a pr, making a final, and winning a medal are a few of the positives enjoyed by youngsters all eager to find their place in the athletics sun. All Jamaican competitors basked in the glory of being on a winning team, but there were some who were disappointed in their individual performances. Some members of teams at the bottom of the totem pole exulted in winning a medal and hoped to return next year, despite the fact that Jamaica would be again at the top of the medal table.

Likewise, Jamaicans will continue to compete at the Olympics although knowing that they will not finish above the United States on the medal table. But Jamaicans and all Caribbean people are proud that Jamaica can hold its own in one discipline of the Olympics — athletics — despite its size and economy.

Allow me, however, to clarify a couple of points raised by Johnston. Race or ethnicity has little to do with the omission of non-Anglophone countries in Carifta — the French and the Dutch are invited. The Anglophone Caribbean is the last subregional group to fall under the umbrella of the International Association of Athletics Federations. There is no need for duplication, since all Caribbean countries compete at the Central American and Caribbean Games and the Junior Pan American Games.

Jamaica started to produce world beaters since the 1940s, but there was a 20-year hiatus (1976-1996) when the talent dried up. After that period Jamaica began to reassert itself on the world stage peaking with the world’s greatest sprinter, Usain Bolt. The women must not be overlooked in this resurgence.

Whatever rivalries or misunderstandings there may be in politics or sport, West Indians regard Herb McKenley, Arthur Wint, George Rhoden, Usain Bolt, Donald Quarrie, Hasely Crawford, Keshorn Walcott, Kirani James, Merlene Ottey, Grace Jackson, Deon Hemmings, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, Veronica Campbell Brown, Pauline Davis, and many others as sons and daughters deeply rooted in the Caribbean soil. And that may include other greats such as Alberto Juantorena. For, as celebrated West Indian historian Eric Williams has noted, we have more commonalities than differences in our history.

May the Carifta Games continue to prosper for the benefit of the youth of the region.Basil A Ince is a Trinbagonian and author of Black Meteors: The Caribbean in International Track and Field (Ian Randle Publishers, 2012). He was privileged to join his Jamaican colleagues to win gold for the British West Indies in the 1,600-m relay at the Pan American Games in Chicago in 1959. Send comments to the Observer or basil_ince@yahoo.com.