Elton Tucker, Assistant Sport Editor

BEIJING, China:

Veronica Campbell-Brown, the nation's most out-standing performer in Athens, Greece, four years ago, is scheduled to march with the country's flag this morning, Jamaica time, at the official opening ceremony for the Games of the 29th Olympiad in Beijing, China.

Campbell-Brown was the unanimous choice for the honour as, Chef de Mission Don Anderson said she was the only individual gold medallist in the 57-member team. She also has a relay gold medal.

The ceremony is set to start at 8:08 p.m. in China (7:08 a.m. locally).

Anderson said the choice of a flag-bearer usually depended on the quality of that person's past performances and Campbell's stood out.

The 26-year-old former Vere Technical and Arkansas University student won the 200 metres final in Athens before leading the sprint relay team to victory. Earlier, she had won a bronze medal in the 100m. The current Games is Campbell-Brown's third. She was a member of the quartet which won silver behind The Bahamas at Sydney in 2000.

However, Campbell, who finished fourth at the National Championships in June, will not likely be able to improve on her bronze medal finish from Athens as she failed to automatically qualify.

Campbell-Brown won the 100m gold at last year's World Championships.

Anderson gave a firm assurance that the problems which have dogged the team at the training camp in Tianjin earlier this week will not spill over into arrange-ments for the opening ceremony.

"I can assure you that everything has been sorted out," he told The Gleaner, adding that a meeting was held yesterday and everything went well.

Equestrian

The first Jamaican to see action tomorrow will be equestrian competitor Samantha Albert. The British-based Albert will compete in day one of the three-day competition.

The opening discipline is the dressage, followed by cross-country the following day and showjumping on the final day.

Albert performed fairly well at the Pan American Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil last year and has been training hard for the event which takes place 1,225 miles away at the Shatin Racing Complex in Hong Kong.

Meanwhile, swimmers Alia Atkinson and Jevon Atkinson will be in action midweek in the 200m breaststroke and the 50m freestyle. The third swimmer, Natasha Moodie, will see action in the 50m freestyle on Friday.

Swimmers

Atkinson will be the first of the swimmers to take to the pool. She bows into action in her second Olympic Games in the 200m breaststroke next Wednesday. Coach Jackie Walter said she was preparing well for the event.

"She only got in yesterday (Wednesday) and is still a bit tired. She had two workouts today (Thursday) and the last one was better than the first, so she is doing pretty well," Walter said.

The infamous Beijing smog is still hovering over the city but there have as yet been no official complaints that it has been causing any respiratory problems. Early yesterday morning it was parti-cularly bad. From close up, the smog appeared to be a mixture of fog and dust. Both combined to reduce visibility on the main city highways to less than 300 metres.

elton.tucker@gleanerjm.com