Final assault at Napsac

When the curtains come down on the finals of the Pine Hill 2016 National Primary Schools Athletics Championships (NAPSAC), there will be glory for some and disappointment for others. Charles F. Broome Primary are the reigning Boys Champions, while West Terrace are the current Girls Champions and they will be looking to successfully defend their titles this year as the athletes set the track aflame beneath their feet in their final battle on the Ryan Braithwaite track. At this stage it will be a tough to guess any favourites to win but West Terrace have once again shown they are a team to beat with many of their athletes advancing to the finals today.

 

Some of the other schools with athletes advancing to the finals include Bayley’s Primary, St. Paul’s Primary, St. Giles Primary, Good Shepherd Primary, St. Albans Primary, Hilda Skeene, Blackman and Gollop Primary, Wilkie Cumberbatch and Luther Thorne Primary.

 

The action begins at Usain Bolt Sports Complex at 11 a.m. with the 600m Open Girls Race and continues to 3:50 p.m. where the final event of the day, the Under 13 Boys 4x100m Relay, will bring the races to an end at this year’s NAPSAC Championships. Despite the new venue for the championships, the organisers and officials have been extremely efficient and there have been no apparent issues noticeable to the public eye. The standard of the championships has also been high as thirty-one records were broken at the zonal championships.

 

Tiara Stewart is one to watch in the Under 13 Girls Long Jump. Stewart broke the Under 13 Girls Long Jump record at the Quarter-Finals two weeks ago with a jump of 4.82m. She then followed that up last week by breaking her own record with an outstanding leap of 4.96m. She is favored to win today and maybe break her record again in the finals. Duncan Daniel of Bayley’s Primary also broke the Under 11 Boys Long Jump record with a jump of 4.93m in the Semi- Finals last week, and he will be looking to not only repeat his gold medal performance but also out jump last week’s distance today.

 

There will be some battles throughout the day between the fastest and best athletes who have advanced from their zonal championships, Quarter-final and through last week’s Semi-finals to today’s finals. Specifically there will be a fight between Samiya Dell of Sharon Primary School, Kelicia Downes of Arthur Smith Primary School and Skye Spencer-Layne in the Under 11 Division. Dell has mainly qualified with the fastest times among the three but she must repeat those performances to keep the others at bay. They will be competing in the Under 11 100m, 200m and the Long Jump. There will also be a clash in the upper Under 13 Girls Division where Naomi Forde Hinds of St. Pauls Primary will face off against Azariah Nurse of Bayley’s Primary School and Aaliyah Agard of Ignatius Byer Primary School in the Under 13 Girls 100m and 200m. The distance runners Shakacia Watson of Good Shepherd Primary will try to run down Jahzara Holford of West Terrace in the Girls 600m Open. They both are the top female distance runners in their division, Holford in Under 11 and Watson in Under 13.

 

The Boys Division will have match ups as well. Teammates Chaz Searles and Achilles Browne of St. Stephen’s Primary will be challenged by Amir Gustave in the 200m dash while they will see who between them can win the 100m for St. Stephen’s.

 

Tia Applewaite of St. Giles Primary and Joshua Moore will be two athletes to look out for as they have dominated the Under 9 Division from the first time they stepped onto the track this year at Usain Bolt. They will be competing in the 80m, 100m and 150m sprints. (AS)