The first track and field competition of the season was held at National Sports Centre on Saturday with four athletes meeting the qualifying standard for next year?s CARIFTA Games.

National coach Gerry Swan said he was pleased with the results and expressed confidence that others would meet the standard in weeks to come.

?It was a very positive weekend when the meet was held in conjunction with the Front Street Mile trials and I am very optimistic that others will qualify in the coming weeks,? said Swan.

The four who qualified were Latroya Darrell, Zindzi Swan, Derrick Golding and James Bergl.

Darrell, competing in the under-17 female category, qualified with an 11.45 metre leap in the triple jump (beating the standard by 70 centimetres) and with 1.65 metres in the high jump which was just three centimetres short of her silver medal performance at this year?s Games in Trinidad.

Swan, in the female under-20 age group and a gold medallist in the long jump at the 2002 Games as well as the women?s national record holder in both the long jump and high jump, made the high jump qualifying mark with an effort of 1.65 metres.

Golding and Bergl both registered personal bests in the discus.

Golding improved on his previous distance by more than three metres when he threw 39.58 to surpass the CARIFTA qualifying mark by more than five metres while Bergl, a 2002 CARIFTA finalist and the current junior national record holder, hurled the disc to a new record distance of 47.33 metres, going 4.3 metres beyond his previous junior national record.

Three other athletes, Deon Brangman (under-20) and Jade Darrell and Kijaun Wilkinson (both under-17), narrowly missed their respective qualifying marks in the high jump.

Swan was optimistic about the national programme going into preparations for CARIFTA, noting that he expected the current number of 20 training with the squad to increase considerably.

?Right now I can?t say what the numbers will be like but of those already in the programme I feel most are legitimate contenders for a CARIFTA place. Rain and the threat of bad weather on Sunday obviously prevented many from coming out, but we did have some new faces at training and I expect it to get better this week,? said Swan.