By Elton Tucker, Assistant Sport EditorThe 2004 Victoria Mutual Building Society (VMBS) Boys and Girls Championships is shaping up to be one of the most exciting in recent years. It will be close among the top five boys and top five girls schools. Our top five boys are Kingston College, Calabar High, Jamaica College, St. Jago High and Wolmer's Boys. The top five girls schools Holmwood Technical, St. Jago High, Vere Technical, Edwin Allen High and St. Andrew High. Today we highlight two of the 10 schools.
DEFENDING BOYS champions Kingston College will be going for their fourth title in a row and their 28th overall and new head coach Lennox Graham is clear in his mind about the task ahead.
"We expect this year's meet to be a much closer contest than last year when we amassed 242 points to win by 92," Graham said on Monday. He named St. Jago, Calabar and Jamaica College as the teams to watch but said KC are well prepared for all comers.
"There will be a lot of good things from other teams and as such the meet will be competitive. But we are confident in our abilities and we will be coming to win.
"We have lost stalwarts such as Kimani Williams (400m and 4x400m), Kimani Kirton in the throws, pole vaulter Wasim Walker and Herman Clarke in the 4x400m and it will be challenging for us to duplicate the amount of points we tallied last year," the KC head coach said.
Despite losing so many leading athletes in the top class, Graham said KC will be blazing from all cylinders come the championships in two weeks and he expects the first year Class 1 athletes to step up to the plate.
OUR STRENGTH
"Our strength again lies in Class 1," Graham said. "Andre Wellington (100m and 200m) and Alain Bailey (high jump and long jump) are coming up as champions from Class 2. Fabian Morgan was second in the throws (shot put and discus) last year in Class 1 while Carlos Mattis should do well in the long, triple and high jump events."
Wellington, a good servant of KC since Class 3, won the Class 2 100m and 200m in record times of 10.71 and 21.59 seconds last year and many eyes will be on him to see what improvement he has made this year.
The KC coach feels that on paper Class 2 was possibly their weakest as they will have to contend with a strong JC team on the track and in addition most of his athletes were in the class for the first time.
"Our leading athletes in this class should be Cawayne Jervis, a finalist in the 100m last year and Omari Dokie, the Class 2 high jump champion."
Tarik Batchelor in the sprints and long jump and Andre Peart, sprints and hurdles will carry the torch for the purple and white-clad KC in Class 3.
"Batchelor and Peart will do multiple events but in Class 3 it is sometimes difficult to predict what will happen as unlike the top two classes where athletes have been performing for four or more years and we know what to expect, people can just pop up in Class 3," Graham said.
In the open events the KC coach has high hopes for last year's Penn Relays champion Mattis in the triple jump, to score heavily in the pole vault, and also to be among the top teams in the 4x400m.
"The pole vault is an event in which we have always done well and this year will be no different," he said.
Overall Graham is predicting possibly a four-way tussle among KC, Calabar, JC and St. Jago.
"Earlier this year, St. Jago won the JC meet and they also topped the hurdles and field events championships so they appear to be very rounded. JC and Calabar are strong in the relays. The points will be shared and we should have as good a chance as any of again topping the championships," Graham concluded.
