23 medals consisting of three golds, 7 silvers and 13 bronzes were hauled by players from Barbados at the Manhattan Beach Junior International Badminton Tournament. The recently concluded sporting event was held in Los Angeles, California.

Ryan Toppin, head coach of team Barbados attributed this record breaking haul of medals to the revisits they had on the three-year plan for their juniors and their lightweight Yonex badminton rackets.

Toppin stated, “The difference this year is that we took a year off and decided to put in some serious hard work and training with the team. We sat down and we developed a plan. We had a three-year plan, but after last year when we had the three [bronze] medals, we revisited it, made some changes and it seemed to have worked fairly well for us.” Indeed with the records they broke at the tournaments with the number of medals they had, the strategy Toppin explained clearly worked well for them.

Training at the summer camp was challenging for the whole team. They were fit and healthy but as they were kept together, together they experienced challenges to improve their skills needed in the game. The team experienced a lack of badminton playing fields in their locality but they were able to do with the hall in Garrison School. They were there twice a week to practice yet to them, it was not enough.

The coaching staff and the players really made an effort to achieve what they are able to achieve in the Manhattan Beach Junior International Badminton Tournament, explains Toppin further. He gave credit to Athelstone Forde and Shakeira Waithe, both of which are coaches for the Bajans.

Bradley Pilgrim, Monyata Riviera and Mikiela Carrington were expected to do good in their matches and they met these expectations during matches.