DIONNE ROSE-Henley struck gold in the women's 100 metre hurdles final at 19th Central American and Caribbean Games in El Salvador to increase Jamaica's medal tally to 11 at the end of yesterday's action.
A nominee at last year's Carreras Sports Foundation's awards, Rose-Henley clocked 13.67 to beat P. Oliveros of Colombia (13.72) and Haiti's Nadin Faustin (13.84) into second and third places respectively. Rose-Henley's gold followed up gold medals won earlier last week by Iona Wynter (cycling) and Angela Chuck (swimming), which has moved Jamaica's tally to three gold, three silver and five bronze at the Games.
Despite her fourth-place finish at the recent National Junior and Senior Athletic Championships, Rose-Henley had no problems in helping Jamaica to their eighth place position among the 30 competing countries. The Jamaicans are behind Mexico, Venezuela, Colombia, Dominican Republic, hosts El Salvador, Guatemala and Puerto Rico. Costa Rica and Trinidad and Tobago complete the top 10.
In hockey, Jamaica picked up their third silver medal after the female team was beaten 4-1 by Trinidad and Tobago in the final.
Tashna Cooke gave the Jamaicans some hope when she struck to level the score 1-1 at the halftime interval, but Trinidad rallied to take the game.
Meanwhile, in the 200 metre finals, Jamaica will be represented by two athletes. Christopher Williams, who placed second in his semi-final heat, enters the final with the fourth fastest time behind Juan Toledo (21.03) of Mexico, Dion Crabbe (21.04) of British Virgin Islands and Venezuela's Hely Ollarves (21.07), while Jenice Daley (24.42) made it to the female final despite her fourth place finish as one of the fastest losers.
Jamaica are expected to see more medals as welterweight boxer Tsetsi Davis is assured of a least a bronze medal after stopping Hugo Moolenaar of the Virgin Islands in the third round of a quarter-final bout yesterday. He will face Mexico's N. Gonzalez in tomorrow's semi-finals.
Bantamweight Rudolph Hedge had earlier lost to A. Nunez of El Salvador and Sheldon Rudolph was beaten by Venezuela's P. Lopez in preliminary bounts. Both contests were stopped by the referee in the third round.
