Rally Club pays tribute to Brathwaite

The Barbados Rally Club (BRC) has paid tribute to Jamal Kirby Brathwaite, a long-standing competitor and member of its Committee of Management for more than a decade.

Brathwaite was involved in a fatal road accident in the United States in the early hours of Saturday.

“The motorsport community has lost a great man,” BRC Chairman Neil Corbin said.

Brathwaite was something of a rarity, having won championships across all of the BRC’s disciplines. He was the MudDogs Novice Driver Champion (2004), Novice Navigator Champion (2005) and joint Autocross Champion (2010), by which time he had joined the enthusiastic band at the ‘Chicken Pen’ (Norman Catwell’s ad hoc organisation, which has encouraged many newcomers into the sport).

Class championship titles followed in Modified 6 and M7 in the Mitsubishi Colt and Honda Civic respectively, and Brathwaite also had class wins in Rally Barbados.

Since 2011, he had been a member of the club’s Committee of Management, initially as secretary, most recently as competition secretary.

Son of Trevor Mapp, a long-standing competitor and volunteer, it was a given that Jamal would become a committed member of the island’s wider motor sport family.

“I have always had some fantastic battles and he was very quick behind the wheel. When he first purchased his civic ‘Cindy’, he referred to me as “benchmark”, as he constantly compared his times with mine in the starlet, often coming out on top in the 2wd standings,” Corbin said.

“When I decided to retire the starlet, I purchased my GT86 to compete alongside Jamal in Modified 2. Learning of this horrific accident has been very hard for me and my condolences go out to Trevor and the rest of his friends and family. He was such a genuine person and the motorsport community has lost a great man.”

The Barbados Rally Club offers its sincere condolences to Jamal’s family and his many friends in the sport across the island.
(PR)