LEXINGTON, Ky., and PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad and Tobago – Two more Kentucky Wildcats – Rondel Sorrillo and Mikel Thomas — confirmed places in the 2016 Olympic Games, at the Trinidad and Tobago Championships in Hasely Crawford Stadium on Saturday.
Sorrillo – the 2009 NCAA 200-Meter Champion who now serves on the UK track and field staff as a volunteer assistant coach while training under head coach Edrick Floréal’s direction and competing for Nike – ran a personal-best 9.99 seconds (+1.7 meters/second) to place second in the 100m final.
Sorrillo ran a wind-legal sub-10-second 100m time for the first time. That time is better than the Olympic standard, and Trinidad and Tobago has three quota places at the Olympics meaning Sorrillo meets criteria to be selected as a T&T representative in the 100m in Rio di Janeiro later this summer.
Sorrillo earned his nation’s quota place in the 200m, and the T&T semifinals and finals in that event will be run on Sunday.
Fellow UK alumnus Mikel Thomas won the T&T 110m hurdles in 13.67 (-1.0) on Saturday, also earning a spot on the T&T Olympic Team.
Thomas and Sorrillo will each be competing in their third Olympic Games for T&T.
They will be joined in Rio by fellow UK alum Luis Orta, who qualified ran a standard time earlier this year, qualifying to represent Venezuela in the marathon.
Jasmine Camacho-Quinn – who earlier this month became the first freshman to win the NCAA 100m Hurdles Championship – was selected to compete for Puerto Rico at the games earlier this year.
The United States Olympic Team Trials will take place July 1-11 in Eugene, Oregon and a plethora of Wildcats and alumni are entered.
Olympic team trials and their equivalent meetings are taking place across the world in the coming weeks.
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The most up-to-date coverage of the UK track and field program is available via @KentuckyTrack handles on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
by Jake Most