Ashmeade focused on the 200 m at the 2008 World Junior Championships in Athletics and he took the silver medal in the event, narrowly finishing behind France's Christophe Lemaitre. A second silver came in the 4×100 m relay and he departed from his usual oeuvre to help Jamaica to fourth place in the 4 × 400 m relay. The regional CARIFTA Games provided him the opportunity for further junior medals: he won the 200 m title and two relay gold medals at the 2008 edition and almost repeated the feat in 2009, with the sole difference being a 4×400 m relay silver. His final international outing as a junior athlete came at the 2009 Pan American Junior Athletics Championships in Port of Spain and he won the 200 m gold in a personal best of 20.40 seconds before going on to take a relay bronze medal.