Seven time National Ladies Champion KAREN MEAKINS is featured with nine other ladies in a newspaper article tribute to women who have achieved success in the sporting arena locally. The article is in the Barbados Saturday Sun published on March 8, 2008 and was submitted by the Women In Sports Comissission of the Barbados Olympic Association (BOA) in conjunction with the National Sports Council (NSC) to celebrate International Women’s Day (March 8th). The Women In Sports Commission is an arm of the BOA and works towards the promotion of women in sports.
Karen Meakins has been the dominant female player of this decade and has won seven straight Barbados National Squash titles (2001-07) and eight Barbados Open titles (1993, 2002-05 & 2007). She has participated with much success overseas as well and has won the St. Lucia Squash Open for the last four years (2004-07) and is the defending Trinidad & Tobago Squash Open champion (2007). She has represented Barbados at the last three Southern Caribbean Squash Championships (which are held every other year) and won the Ladies Individual title in 2002 (and was runner-up in 2004 and 2006) and also placed second in the last two biennial Caribbean Squash Championships in 2005 & 2007.
Karen also won two bronze medals for Barbados in squash (as a member of the Ladies team and in mixed doubles) at the 20th Central American and Caribbean Games in Cartagena, Colombia in July 2006. She is also a SRA certified level 3 coach and has coached the Barbados Ladies team to numerous titles at the Caribbean level since 2001.
Local U-17 & U-19 squash champion, CHERI-ANN PARRIS was also recently recognised at the National Sports Council’s 25th Annual National Sports Awards Ceremony, held on March 1, 2008 and was one of three girls short listed in the 2007 Junior Outstanding Sportsperson (Female) category that was won by Deandra Dottin of Athletics. {N.B. The third girl nominated in this category was Tanya Marshall for her excellent performances in Martial Arts. Tanya is also a member of the National Junior Squash Team!]
Cheri-Ann is unarguably the most outstanding female junior squash player from Barbados in two decades and has won multiple National junior squash titles as well as five straight Caribbean Junior Squash titles (i.e. U-13 [2003], U-15 twice [2004-05], U-17 [2006] and is the reigning Caribbean U-19 Ladies Champion [July 2007]. In 2006 she won a bronze medal at the 20th CAC Games in Cartegena, Colombia as part of the Barbados Ladies Senior Squash Team and last year also won a bronze medal at the junior (U-19) Pan-American Squash Championships, that were held in Kingston, Jamaica in October. Cheri-Ann also won two medals in April 2007 at the inaugural Colombian Junior Squash Open in Bogota, Colombia [U-17: silver; U-19: bronze] and has been a regular participant in the Junior U.S.A., British and Scottish Squash Opens in recent years.
In August 2007 Cheri-Ann represented her country at the Women’s Junior World Squash Championships in Hong Kong, China and won her first round match easily, before being eliminated in round 2. She is already an important member of the National Senior team and last year finished runner-up (to Meakins) in the Senior Ladies National Championships and third in the Senior Caribbean Squash Championships in the Ladies Individuals (behind Caribbean Champion, Karen Anderson [J’ca] and runner-up Karen Meakins [B’dos].
