Record Car­ni­val King Cur­tis Eu­stace and reign­ing Car­ni­val Queen Rox­anne Oma­lo added to their al­ready im­pres­sive tro­phy cab­i­net on Sun­day night at the Di­manche Gras show. 

Eu­stace and Oma­lo each topped 10 strong fel­low in­di­vid­ual mas­quer­aders to se­cure their 10th and fourth ti­tles, re­spect­ful­ly, in the fi­nal of the com­pe­ti­tion at the Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah. 

The duo did not on­ly walk away with records and a year’s worth of brag­ging rights but they each left the venue with the keys to brand a new Suzu­ki Grand Vi­tara as well as an undis­closed cash prize. 

Speak­ing with Guardian Me­dia short­ly af­ter she learned that she man­aged to re­tain her crown, Oma­lo thanked the T&T Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Bands As­so­ci­a­tions (TTNC­BA) for in­tro­duc­ing the grand prizes that were a re­sult of a re­cent part­ner­ship with Lifestyle Mo­tors. 

The proud Ma­yaro res­i­dent said: “It is a great in­cen­tive for peo­ple to en­gage in the mas are­na and come greater in 2026.” 

She not­ed that the prize had spe­cial sig­nif­i­cance for her af­ter some­one stole the bat­tery for her ve­hi­cle at her home last month. 

“God knows and he knew I want such and he de­liv­ered for me. I al­ways say thanks to the most high,” she said. 

In a brief in­ter­view, for­mer TTNC­BA pres­i­dent and cur­rent Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Com­mis­sion (NCC) di­rec­tor Ros­alind Gabriel ex­pressed hope that the prizes would re­main. 

Asked how the prizes would be shared be­tween the win­ning mas­quer­aders and the de­sign­ers of their cos­tumes, Gabriel ex­plained that the prizes would be pre­sent­ed to the win­ning mas­quer­aders, who would then be re­spon­si­ble for split­ting the pro­ceeds of their suc­cess­ful per­for­mance based on a pre­arranged agree­ment. 

Eu­stace, a con­sum­mate per­former with the most ex­pe­ri­ence of those on show, man­aged to main­tain his lead from the semi­fi­nal round and dom­i­nate the Car­ni­val King com­pe­ti­tion with his pre­sen­ta­tion Spir­it of ‘D” Gaspree Cave. 

Eu­stace’s eerie pre­sen­ta­tion be­gan with a ghoul­ish nar­ra­tion backed with elec­tron­ic dance mu­sic (EDM) beat which tran­si­tioned in­to Prob­lem Child’s Car­ni­val Jumbie. 

Eu­stace, whose cos­tume was among the largest in the com­pe­ti­tion, earned the loud­est ap­plause from the au­di­ence as he high­light­ed his trade­mark dance moves in front of the judges and the ro­bot­ic move­ment of the head, wings and tail of his in­tri­cate cos­tume, which was aid­ed by winch­es and pneu­mat­ic ac­tu­a­tors. 

A sto­ic Eu­stace seemed un­fazed by his his­toric achieve­ment. 

“Nine was good, but ten is bet­ter to put some dis­tance in the his­to­ry books,” he said. 

He ad­mit­ted that he be­gan com­pet­ing in al­ter­nate years af­ter his younger broth­er Ted de­cid­ed to car­ry on their fam­i­ly’s rich lega­cy in the com­pe­ti­tion. 

Ted, who al­ready has four ti­tles, failed to ef­fec­tive­ly com­pete with his sib­ling up­on his re­turn as he tied for sev­enth place with his equal­ly grand cos­tume Jour­ney to Ma­yaro. 

Eu­stace said he took a brief hia­tus from com­pet­ing but de­cid­ed to re­turn to re­join his broth­er and on the in­vi­ta­tion of Spir­it Mas band­leader Adri­an Scoon. 

“When I joined the band, he said would you do me a favour, I would like you to rep­re­sent the band,” he said. 

Eu­stace praised his oth­er broth­er Mar­cus, who he cred­it­ed for 99 per cent of the work be­hind the cos­tume. He al­so thanked his fam­i­ly’s sup­port team, who en­sured that the tech­ni­cal as­pects of his cos­tume were ex­e­cut­ed with­out a hitch.

“We have a fan­tas­tic crew...We have so many hands that fill the pot to make this hap­pen,” he said. 

Eu­stace said he was yet to de­cide whether he planned to de­fend his crown. 

From chal­lenges to Queen

In the Queen of Car­ni­val com­pe­ti­tion, Oma­lo im­proved on her third place stand­ing in the semi­fi­nal round with her cos­tume “Sire­na-Mis­tress of the Seas”, which de­pict­ed a men­ac­ing mer­maid-like sea crea­ture es­cort­ed by a team of sword­fish. The grandiose cos­tume was de­signed by Var­ma Lakhan. 

Hav­ing over­come per­son­al chal­lenges ear­li­er this year, she said was con­fi­dent of her chances of adding to her wins in 2018, 2020, and last year, even be­fore cross­ing the stage. 

“I came in­to the com­pe­ti­tion to win...I al­ways ex­e­cute the hard­est in the fi­nals,” she said. 

“When I came here tonight and did not feel any breeze, I say right, I have them,” she added. 

Oma­lo, who vowed to re­tire from com­pet­ing when she won her sec­ond crown in 2020 but re­turned with a vic­to­ry, last year, de­clined to pre­dict her fu­ture par­tic­i­pa­tion, once again.

“When I said in 2020 that this would be the end of it, my team con­vinced me that I was just win­ning ti­tles and of the po­ten­tial I have, so I de­cid­ed to re­turn,” she said.

She ded­i­cat­ed her vic­to­ry to her son and daugh­ter, who was born dur­ing her brief stint away from the com­pe­ti­tion. 

Her vic­to­ry meant that Rana Kan­doo’s hopes of se­cur­ing the ti­tle on her de­but in the com­pe­ti­tion were dashed af­ter a strong show­ing in the pre­lim­i­nary and semi­fi­nal rounds. Kan­doo placed sec­ond. 

Her next clos­est com­peti­tor was Nicole Her­cules, who placed third with a grand but­ter­fly de­sign al­so from Eu­stace’s broth­er Mar­cus. 

Oma­lo al­so held off Priya Nag­gasar, who won the com­pe­ti­tion in 2023, and two-time win­ner Shynel Brizan, who were vy­ing to add to their ti­tles. 

Vet­er­an mas­quer­ad­er Lau­ra Ram­per­sad, whose son An­to­nio re­tained his Ju­nior King of Car­ni­val and whose daugh­ter placed third in the Ju­nior Queen of Car­ni­val in her first fi­nal ap­pear­ance on Wednes­day night, placed fourth. Her hus­band, Mar­lon, who de­signed and con­struct­ed the fam­i­ly’s cos­tumes, bare­ly missed out on a place in the fi­nal. 

Daz­zles and de­lays

It was a night to for­get in the Car­ni­val King com­pe­ti­tion for reign­ing monarch Joseph Lewis, who al­so won the ti­tle in 2019 and 2022, as he was com­pre­hen­sive­ly beat­en to a last-place fin­ish. 

Vet­er­an mas­quer­ad­er Fareid Car­val­ho, a reg­u­lar fix­ture in the fi­nals of the com­pe­ti­tion, nar­row­ly missed out on his best chance of se­cur­ing the cov­et­ed ti­tle af­ter a strong show­ing in the pre­vi­ous rounds as he placed sec­ond. 

While those present were treat­ed to a daz­zling and dra­mat­ic dis­play of cos­tume de­sign from all 22 mas­quer­aders, the com­pe­ti­tion was not in­ci­dent free as there was a long de­lay be­tween the last queen and first king cross­ing the stage. 

The pro­tract­ed de­lay could be eas­i­ly at­trib­uted to the long cast of guest mu­si­cal per­form­ers be­ing af­ford­ed ar­guably more time than the com­peti­tors on the night. 

It re­sult­ed in an ob­vi­ous domi­no ef­fect on the en­tire Di­manche Gras pro­duc­tion with the fi­nal re­sults of Car­ni­val King and Queen and the Ca­lyp­so Monarch com­pe­ti­tions be­ing an­nounced close to 2 am when most of the au­di­ence had al­ready left. 

The as­tro­naut-themed show en­ti­tled Take Me Home was the brain­child of NCC cre­ative di­rec­tor Davlin Thomas, who reimag­ined tra­di­tion­al sailor mas with a space-age take. 

Guest per­form­ers, back­up dancers and even the Ro­man Catholic priest, who de­liv­ered a prayer to open the spec­ta­cle, be­ing dressed in space­suits. 

2025 Car­ni­val King and Queen Re­sults

Queen of Car­ni­val 

1. Rox­anne Oma­lo - Sire­na-Mis­tress of the Seas  - 443

2. Rana Kan­doo - Maiya- God­dess of Cre­ation  - 439

3. Nicole Her­cules - De Tiger But­ter­fly - 429 

4. Lau­ra Ram­per­sad - Queen Ne­fer­ti­ti - 424

5. Takeyah Fletch­er-Mar­shall - Car­ni­val Our Gold­en Jew­el - 417 (tie)

5. Shynel Brizan - Queen Ade­laide Di­son - 417 (tie)

7. Liesha McEach­nie - Es­prit De Lib­erte (The Hunt­ed Jab from Ca­roni Sug­ar Es­tate) - 415

8. Cher­ry Ann Valere - So­lar­ia Fire­bird of Light and Life  - 414

9. Priya Na­gas­sar - “Nan­di” An African Queen -  412

10. Sav­it­ri Ho­lassie - Beira-Queen of Eter­nal Win­ter - 401

11. Tur­ona Ramb­harose - The Sun­rise and Sun­set Over the Sa­hara - 391

King of Car­ni­val

 1. Cur­tis Eu­stace - Spir­it of D Gaspree Cave - 447

2. Fareid Car­val­ho - Dralo­zo a Be­ing From the Sun - 445

3. Er­ron Sookdeo - An African Drum­mer - 433

4. Ravi Lakhan - Mid­night Rob­ber - Lord of Dark­ness & Death  - 431

5. Ray­mond Mark - Oberon - King of Fairy­land and the Pro­tec­tor of the For­est - 430 (tie) 

5. Arif Gran­tum - Ja­far Sor­cer­er of Agrabah - 430 (tie)

7. Ted Eu­stace - Jour­ney to Ma­yaro - 421 (tie)

7. Franklyn Jagdeo - Spir­it of an African Witch Doc­tor - 421 (tie)

9. Rus­sell Grant - King Samp­son - 420 (tie)

9. Ke­ston Ben­thum - Not­sek Bar­do - 420 (tie)

11. Joseph Lewis - Jaix­ue Shen­long - Guardian of the Uni­verse  - 416