Michelle Smith, a sophomore at Montverde Academy in Florida but a native of St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands, represented her home island in spectacular fashion this past weekend in Kingston, Jamaica for the CARIFTA Games, which is the annual spring event showcasing the best high school-aged talent of the Caribbean nations and territories.
Smith was the champion in both the U-17 girls 400-meter hurdles on Saturday and 800m run on Monday, while also securing a silver medal in the 100mH in between both races.
Her time of 58.61 in the 400mH broke the U17 meet record in the event and is the second-fastest time recorded by any U.S. high school athlete this spring.
Her victory was a dominant one as the next closest competitor was Jody-Ann Daley of Jamaica at 1:02.22.
In the 100mH, Smith clocked a new personal best time of 14.31 while running into a -1.8 meters per second headwind -- and down in lane 2 -- to close well and nab second place.
Smith had a prior personal best of 14.64 from the Louie Bing Invitational earlier this season.
The versatile Smith finished off her amazing weekend of races at the CARIFTA Games with a runaway victory in the 800m run, taking the lead from the gun and going out in just under 62 seconds for the first 400m split.
Smith continued to carry her lead into the finish and won in a new personal best time of 2:10.78, besting her prior personal best of 2:10.93 from the Florida Relays.
All three of her performances at the CARIFTA Games set new Virgin Islands National U20 Records.
She will be returning to Florida and Montverde Academy this week and competing in the FHSAA 2A District 7 meet on Monday, April 25 at Lake Highland Prep.
The meet will be live-streamed on fl.milesplit.com.
