GUYANA’S national men’s and women’s table tennis teams departed yesterday for Cuba to seek qualification for the 2018 Central American and Caribbean Games.
The event begins today and goes until March 4 with the Latin American Table Tennis Championship beginning immediately after

The seven-member team includes national men’s table tennis champion Christopher Franklin, Nigel Bryan, Shemar Britton, Joel Alleyne and on the distaff side Natalie Cummings, Jody Ann Blake and Trenace Lowe who will join the team from the USA.
In the qualification event, 13 teams on the men’s side and nine women’s teams from the CAC region will vie for qualification.

Guyana will be missing the services of national women’s champion Chelsea Edghill who is currently engaged in final-year studies.
The qualifiers will also serve as a key preparation and warm-up event, based on the fact that several of the selected players for the qualifiers are also in the Commonwealth Games squad.

More strategically, the team is made up of a nucleus of players selected for the Commonwealth Games and will also be participating in the Latin American table tennis championships.
The team has been hard in training for these games and our prospects for CAC qualification and medal chances are quite good.

According to the GTTA, the events (CAC Qualifiers and Latin American Championships) are part of their high-intensity schedule with plans also in the pipeline to have key players attend a high-yield training camp in Germany leading into the CAC Games.

“We feel this will truly provide a great opportunity to have our players actively involved in high-level competition and training which will provide continuity in our players’ competition and training regimen and which will significantly improve our medal prospects for the CAC Games and the senior Caribbean championships,” a statement said.

The Central America and Caribbean Games will run from July19 to August 3 in Barranquilla, Colombia.

The GTTA would like to express appreciation and a heartfelt ‘thank you’ to the Guyana Olympic Association and Connections Travel Service for assisting the association’s efforts in getting the team to Cuba.