Donna Raynor has every reason to be optimistic over the island’s medal hopes in the middle-distance events at the Carifta Games in April.

The Bermuda National Athletics Association president was blown away by the promising performances achieved by a trio of runners, who all reached the Carifta qualifying times during the first track meet of the year at the National Stadium last weekend.

Kahzi Sealey, Tommy Marshall and Ryan Outerbridge became the island’s first three athletes to qualify for the upcoming Games, which Bermuda are hosting for the fifth time from April 10 to 13.

Sealey and Marshall qualified in the under-17 boys 3,000 metres, with Sealey clocking a time of 9min, 34sec to go under the qualifying time of 9:45, while Marshall also went under the mark with a time of 9:40.

Outerbridge achieved the standard in the under-20 5,000 when he clocked a time of 16:50 to go under the qualifying time of 17:00.

“The times that the guys ran were really good,” Raynor said. “It wasn’t like they were slow times or even just under the qualifying standard. All of them were pretty much well inside of the qualifying standard, which is good. They looked like they could push even further, so I’m very pleased.”

Raynor said the trio’s performances came as no surprise given they have been active throughout the autumn and winter.

“I am not surprised that’s our middle-distance athletes,” she added. “As you know they have had a pretty long and tough cross-country season and then they’re preparing for the Front Street Mile, so that’s not unusual for the middle-distance runners to be the first qualifiers.”

Three other athletes went close to qualifying in other events, with Daria Desmond just missing out in the girls under-17 1,500 where she ran a time of 5:08, just three seconds over the qualifying time of 5:05.

Nirobi Smith-Mills, who won a gold medal at the previous Carifta Games last year in Cayman Island, ran a time of 1:58.58 in the under-17 boys’ 800. The standard is 1:55.50.

“We had some athletes that were a little bit off of the standard and I think that bodes well for us,” Raynor said.

The qualification deadline is March 15.