Guyana Caribbean boxing kings
MANDEVILLE, Jamaica, CANA - Guyana regained the Caribbean Amateur Boxing Association (CABA) title when they topped the overall standings after the final night of competition on Saturday. In claiming their first championship since 1996, Guyana gathered 46 points to beat Barbados (33), Jamaica (30), and Trinidad and Tobago (27). The Guyanese won the senior championship with 39 points over Jamaica (26), while Trinidad and Tobago and the Bahamas led the junior standings with 14 points each. Barbadian welterweight Junior Greenidge won the boxer of the championship and best senior boxer awards after impressively stopping Guyana's Shyndell Profit in his gold medal bout. Other award winners were Guyana's Leonard Henry (best under-19), Jamaican Tsetsi Davis (best novice), and Trinidadian Dane Mitchell (best under-16). Greenidge exhibited clean punches with accuracy and power, as he outclassed Profit in two rounds, following wins over Jamaican Patrick Miller (quarter-final) on Thursday and Grenada's Kennis Joseph (semi-finals) on Friday. Henry won the under-19 featherweight crown when his Antiguan opponent Dorian Allen was disqualified, Davis captured the novice light welterweight gold medal with a second round stoppage of the Cayman Islands' Manuel Borden, and Mitchell outpointed Barbadian Elkena Sealy in the under-16 lightweight final. Guyana, CABA champions every year from 1990 to 1996, before financial problems prevented their participation in 1997 and 1999, recaptured their label as regional kings in style. They posted big Open (senior) class wins through Merkember Pierre, Darwin Norville and Rudolph Fraser on Saturday night. Pierre defeated the championship's most successful boxer Marcus Thomas of Barbados, to take the middleweight gold medal. Thomas, an eight-time CABA champion and two-time Olympian, was beaten on points by a sharper Pierre. Norville snatched the lightweight title on points over the in-form Grenadian Jewel Lewis, who had beaten defending champion John Kellman (Barbados) on Thursday night. Fraser was also a good winner, outpointing the England-based Barbadian Mark Alexander, who was a Commonwealth Games competitor in Malaysia in 1998. Jamaica, who failed to secure a third consecutive overall CABA title, had a strong closing night showing in the open class, sweeping four of the nine finals in that division. Local stars Kerron Speid, Patrick Daley, and Conrad Scott, retained their titles, and Sheldon Rudolph became the new light welterweight champion. Heavyweight Speid, a Pan Am Games bronze medallist in Canada last year, repeated his 1999 points win over Trinidadian Kerston Maxwell, Daley outpointed Trinidadian Nigel Collins for the light middleweight gold medal, and light flyweight Scott stopped Guyana's Wilbert Hutson in two rounds. In the light welterweight final, Rudolph scored a points win over Guyana's Olston Bobb, who had defeated defending champion Sean Hollingsworth of Barbados in Friday night's semi-final.
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