It is 75 years since they first competed at the Olympics but the sporting heritage of Trinidad can be traced back over a century.

There was also a Trinidadian runner at the 1934 British Empire Games in London.

His name was Mannie Albert Dookie and he had won the three miles at the 1933 National Championship, prompting calls for him to compete in London.

Lionel Hannington of the Trinidad Guardian sponsored his passage and he sailed on the Coronado, a ship owned by banana importers Elders and Fyffes.

He ran barefoot and competed in the mile, but was forced to retire in the three and six miles.

After the war, weightlifter Rodney Wilkes won a gold medal at the 1946 Central American and Caribbean Games in Barranquilla.

He was chosen for the 1948 Olympics as the only weightlifter in a team of five which included three athletes and a cyclist.

The weightlifting competition was held at the Empress Hall at Earls Court in West London

Wilkes lifted a total 317.5 kilograms to win a silver medal behind Egyptian Mahmoud Fayad.

In 1951, he also won Trinidad’s first gold medal at the inaugural Pan American Games in Buenos Aires.

Wilkes second Olympic medal, a bronze at the 1952 Games in Helsinki is also featured on the frieze.

Another weightlifter, Lennox Kilgour also took bronze at middle heavyweight.

At Tokyo 1964, Wendell Mottley became the first man to bear Trinidad’s own flag into an Olympic stadium.

Mottley led at half way in the 400 metres final, but was caught 10 metres from the line by Mike Larrabee of the United States and was forced to settle for silver.

Earlier in the Games, Edwin Roberts had claimed a bronze in the 200m.

Roberts and Mottley also won a bronze medal in the with Edwin Skinner and Kent Bernard in the 4x400m.

Two years later in Kingston, Bernard, Roberts and Mottley won Commonwealth Games gold in the 4x440 yards relay, this time with Lennox Yearwood.

Mottley won individual gold in the 440y in a Games record 45.08sec ahead of compatriot Bernard.

At the 1970 Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh, sprinter Hasely Crawford won 100m bronze medal.

Crawford qualified for the Olympic 100m final at Munich 1972 but pulled a muscle after 20 metres which ended his hopes.

Yet in the next three years he became a medal prospect.

In the rarified atmosphere of Mexico City, Crawford won a silver medal at the 1975 Pan-American Games,

At the Montreal Olympics in 1976, he was drawn in lane one of a final which included the defending champion Valeri Borzov a Ukrainian competing for the Soviet Union, Jamaica’s Don Quarrie and two Americans, Harvey Glance and Johnny Lam Jones

Crawford edged ahead to win in 10.06.

He had become Trinidad and Tobago’s first Olympic champion and returned to a heroes reception. 

Prime Minister Eric Williams was part of the welcoming committee.

"It almost looks like the entire population of Trinidad and Tobago have come out here tonight to pay tribute to our great Trinidad hero Mr Hasely Crawford and fittingly also to the Trinidad and Tobago contingent to the Montreal Olympics, and their officials, their manager because It takes more than one person to make a team," Williams told the gathering.

"I want him to know that this is a proper occasion in terms of the sporting community of Trinidad and Tobago to make two or three basic statements of concern sport in Trinidad.

"If Mr Hasely has any ideas about returning to Trinidad and Tobago to live and to work and to inspire the younger people here, he’ll find a lot of people ready to discuss with him, the propositions."

Crawford surveyed the crowd and told them:  I am very happy to be a Trinidadian today.

"I’m very much surprised at the reception I’m getting here and let me say that I am happy,I hope that what I have done will be an inspiration to the younger kids and also I hope that the Government will give us a stadium so that we can produce more Hasely Crawfords."

Crawford eventually had his wish and the stadium which bears his name is to stage athletics at the Commonwealth Youth Games next week.

Many expected Ato Boldon to follow Crawford as an Olympic champion.

He won bronze medalsin the 100m and 200m at the 1996 Centennial Games in Atlanta and claimed silver and bronze in Sydney.

At the 1997 World Athletics Championships in Athens however, Boldon did win over 200m.

A few weeks before the 2012 Olympics in London, Keshorn Walcott threw the javelin 78.64 metres in Barcelona to become world junior champion.

He qualified for the Olympic final in 10th place and threw a national record with his first throw.

Walcott's second throw of 84.58m proved unbeatable on the day.

He was the first champion from the islands in a field event.

"I was even surprised I made the final, I just went out there relaxed because I wasn’t really looking for much," Walcott admitted.

Amongst accolades, they named a lighthouse named in his honour at Galera Point.

The roll of Trinidadian gold was increased last year in Lausanne when Aaron Armstrong, Keston Bledman, Marc Burns, Emmanuel Callender and Richard Thompson received the 4x100m gold medals for the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing from International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach in a special ceremony at the Olympic Museum. 

Trinidad had originally finished in silver medal position but were awarded gold after Jamaica were disqualified when one of their team, Nesta Carter, failed a retrospective drugs test.

"I think in sport anyway we should look always at the bright side of life, finally justice is being done," Bach said.

Thompson, who had also finished second in the 100m at Beijing 2008 behind Usain Bolt, admitted a little bit of frustration it had taken so long for him and his team-mates to be properly recognised. 

"I am very excited and relieved at the same time," he said. "This has been a long time coming. We should have originally won these medals 14 years ago, but the circumstances were beyond our control."

In the last 70 years the majority of Trinidad and Tobago's Olympic medals have come in athletics but the exception came in 2004 when swimmer George Bovell took 200m individual medley bronze in Athens,

More recently, Dylan Carter followed in his wake.

He announced himself with silver and bronze at the 2014 Summer Youth Olympic Games in Nanjing and at the Central American and Caribbean Games title in San Salvador last month he won gold in 100m and 200m freestyle,

The Californian-born Carter has also won three medals at the World Swimming Championships (25m), a silver in the 50m butterfly at Abu Dhabi in 2021 and bronze in the 50m butterfly at Hangzhou in 2018 and the 50m freestyle at Melbourne last year. 

Trinidad and Tobago still await their first female Olympic medallist but last year Diane Henderson succeeded Brian Lewis as President of the National Olympic Committee, the first women to hold the post.

The pride in one of the island’s favourite sons is reflected in the statue of Brian Charles Lara which stands on a boulevard which now bears his name.

Cast in bronze, it was erected in 2011 and depicts Lara playing his signature pull shot, appropriately standing on top of the world.

He struck 277 for West Indies against Australia in January 1993 but his supreme year was to be 1994,

He scored 375 in a test match against England in Antigua to break the record for a Test match innings.

He was greeted by the previous record holder, Sir Garfield Sobers, who had scored 365 in 1958.  

Then in June, he scored 501 for Warwickshire against Durham at Edgbaston, the highest innings ever seen in first class cricket.

Later his unbeaten 153 saw West Indies to an improbable one wicket victory over Australia in 1999.

Then in 2004, Lara struck the first quadruple century seen in test cricket, once again in Antigua and again the luckless bowlers were from England.

Lara had learned his cricket at Harvard Cricket Club in the shadow of The Queen’s Park Oval.

Stands at the ground honour Jeffrey Stollmeyer, a West Indies star in the 1950s, who later became President of the West Indies Cricket Board of Control.

Another stand is named in honour of Learie Constantine, a remarkable cricketer who was later distinguished in the legal profession. 

He became a Queen's Counsel and entered the British House of Lords.. 

Learie’s father Lebrun had toured with the 1900 West Indies team to England.

He struck a century against the Gentlemen of the Marylebone Cricket Club which was described as "a dashing and faultless display".

Son Learie toured England with the first West Indies test team in 1928 and became first West Indies bowler to take a test wicket when he had England's Charlie Hallows caught by Herman Griffith.

Constantine returned bowling figures of four for 82 but could not prevent an innings defeat.

He played 18 test matches in his career and struck five first class hundreds, including a century at Lord’s for West Indies against Middlesex.

It 1950 before the West Indies won a test for the first time and it came at Lord’s, considered the home of cricket.

It was Trinidad-born Sonny Ramadhin who helped engineer the victory, partnering Alf Valentine to bowl his side to victory.

The triumph prompted Aldwyn Roberts, better known as calypso musician Lord Kitchener to produce the Victory Song.

"Cricket Lovely Cricket,at Lord's where I saw it," he sung.

"They gave the crowd plenty fun, second Test and West Indies won.

“With those little pals of mine, Ramadhin and Valentine."

There was no newsreel coverage of the match because of a strike, so Lord Kitchener’s music kept alive the memory of a significant milestone.

A decade later wicket keeper, Deryck Murray made his debut for the West Indies.

Murray could be said to be the man who won the inaugural men’s cricket World Cup, then known as the Prudential Cup, in 1975.

It was his throw in the gathering gloom at Lord’s which ran out Australia’s Jeff Thomson and gave West Indies victory in the Final by 17 runs.

Trinidad and Tobago had also been in at the start of the Women’s World Cup two years earlier.

"Four members of our squad had attended a cricket week in England but the rest of the team had not travelled beyond the Caribbean borders," Trinidad and Tobago captain Louise Brown recalled.

“At that inaugural World Cup, we placed fifth among the seven participating teams,Our participation, however, brought recognition to women's cricket, not only in Trinidad and Tobago and Jamaica, but throughout the Caribbean region,” 

Brown was the team’s run top scorer in the tournament.

"I hope that the present players will continue to be true ambassadors for our sport, and they will represent their country or region with the passion and pride that we did. women's cricket in Trinidad and Tobago, the Caribbean and the world still has a long way to go, but we are on the right track," she said afterwards.

Trinidad and Toago qualified for the FIFA men's World Cup in 2006 in Germany when their captain in all three matches was Dwight Yorke, a member of the Manchester United team that had lifted the treble of Champions League, Premier League and FA Cup in 1999.

In their opening match they drew 0-0 with Sweden in Frankfurt when keeper Shaka Hislop and Yorke both played outstanding matches.

England won the next match 2-0 in Nuremberg but did not score their first until the 83rd minute, before another 2-0 defeat in their final match, against Paraguay in Kaiserslautern.

Yorke played 72 times and scored 19 goals for Trinidad and Tobago and later coached the squad.

A stadium at Scarborough on Tobago now bears his name.

Over the next few days, others are set to take their first steps in international competition in either sport in Trinidad or Tobago.

Those from the host nation will not lack inspiration.