Dominica’s Warren Lawrence set two personal bests Sunday in the swimming events at the 2022 Birmingham Commonwealth Games.
Lawrence secured a 3rd place finish in his heat, in the men’s 50 meters backstroke this morning.
Swimming in Lane 2 in heat number 3, Lawrence clocked 27.32 seconds.
The heat was won by Lamar Taylor of the Bahamas in a time of 26.12 seconds and Harry Robinson finished 2nd with a time of 26.72 seconds. His time, however, was not good enough to get him into the semi-finals of the event.
Lawrence finished 27th overall, out of 45 swimmers.
Lawrence then returned minutes later to take 2nd place in his heat in the Men’s 100-meter Freestyle event.
Lawrence clocked an impressive 53.59 seconds setting another personal best time.
The heat was won by Collins Saliboko of Tanzania in a time of 52.54 seconds.
He finished overall 45th out of the 69 swimmers.
The top 16 advanced to the semi finals.
On Friday, July 29, Lawrence also attained a personal best of 1:00:13 seconds in the 100-meter backstroke event at the games, but was unable to qualify for the semi-finals.
Image gallery credit Dominica Olympic Committee
“Dominca to begin it’s quest for medals at the Commonwealth games in Birmingham “. This was the headline of a release on DNO and we seem to have retreated now to glorifying improvement in personal best times as if it was the same as winning a medal. Wake me up when the two things become the same. I’m going to sleep now.
Mr. St Jean, that’s exactly my thinking. The gentleman got eliminated in the preliminary rounds and some are putting him on a pedestal.
To be brutally honest, this is preposterous.
Excuse me, but I’m just not getting the excitement. To me the goal of participation in international competitive sporting events is to win medals and trophies. He finished 27th out of 45 and 45th out of 69. Even if he wasn’t last but that can’t be good enough for national pride or are we as a nation setting the bar so low that we glow in mediocrity. There is some talent there but it’s excellence that we should be aiming for. I trust that resources such as pools, coaching, other competition will be provided so that in the future he or someone else will be in the finals and earn a medal for Dominca. We know what the international best times are so when we can’t achieve those on a consistent basis there’s no reason to shout out. Let’s get serious about sports in Dominca and provide the necessary resources to achieve national pride like Grenada, T&T and Jamaica do in international sporting events. The goal must be to win medals and trophies and not crow about personal best.
We have now set our standards and expectations at floor level. Instead of trying for excellence, mediocrity is our new standard. It is now accepted and lauded. RIDICULOUS!
I guess Dominica Olympics is now a family affair. Swimmer, his dad and his grand uncle. OK. I will still say congrats to Warren who resides in Europe.
Congratulations Warren. All the very best.
Congratulations to Warren Lawrence his Dad and Billy Doctrove
In this swimming competition, we have three stages, the heats, then semi-finals, and fina!s. Even though Mr. Lawrence achieved a PB (Personal Best! in his Heat, that was not good enough to get him into the semi-final stage. What is there to be overly excited about?
By the way, what was his previous Personal Best? Where is the training swimming facility? Who are the certified swimming coaches? What is needed to attract more young Dominicans to this specific sporting discipline?
As usual, DNO just cut, copy, paste. Their articles are all bones, no flesh. Lazy, shallow journalism, no depth.
Ibo, please do not blame DNO. The article was written and released by the Dominica Olympic Committee, as is made clear in the heading.
I guess Gavin Richards has to justify his presence in Gt. Britain. You would think it is only Warren Lawrence in our team, who’s best personal time is lauded as a great national achievement when in all honesty it makes the young man the subject of ridicule. Best personal time is only of relevance to the performer, not to the rest of the world. After all, my racing pigeon or my dog can have a best personal time! I do not want to belittle Warren but this kind of reporting does him no favours. By the way, is he the only athlete worth of note in our team? I hope the others give a better showing of themselves in the days that remain. I would like to brag a bit about Dominica, do you blame me?
and seems hard pushed to publish anything really positive about ourcountry
Seeing is not always believing; something is not coming through as real!
Here is something real, this is the record of a young American boy from San Diego California.
This black boy: (man) Shaine Casas is an American professional swimmer. He was national champion in the 100-meter backstroke at the 2019 National Championships. In 2021 he was a three-time NCAA champion, once in the 100-yard backstroke, once in the 200-yard backstroke, and once in the 200-yard individual medley. At the 2021 World Short Cour…
200 back bronze medalist at the 2022 World Aquatics Championships
Qualified for the 2021-2022 US National Team in the 100 fly, 100 back, and 200 back
Won gold in two events, silver in three, and one bronze medal at the 2021 World Short Course Championships
I am watching him this minuet where he shattered a world record that is history!
This Dominican and his father are unknown; build an Olympic training center in Dominica; hence athletes can train properly for Olympic events.