Powell
CHAIRMAN OF the Gibson Relays Organising Committee, Neville 'Teddy' McCook expects this year's 29th renewal of the popular one-day relay carnival to be the biggest in three years.
McCook who was speaking at yesterday's sponsors' luncheon at Wray and Nephew on Spanish Town Road, said there has been an upsurge of entries for this year's meet and the number of participants could well go past 2,000 for the February 26 meet at the National Stadium.
"I expect Gibson Relays 2005 to be a tremendous event," McCook added.
McCook who is also the International Association of Athletics Federation's (IAAF) area representative for North America, Central America and the Caribbean, said track and field was alive and well in Jamaica.
THE MESSAGE
"We are finally getting the message across that we are doing a lot of things right locally," the former Jamaica Amateur Athletic Assiciation president said. He highlighted the performance of Olympic 100m and 200m finalist Asafa Powell who is trained locally by Stephen Francis. Powell went below ten seconds for the 100m nine times last year and ended 2004 ranked number one in the event.
In welcoming the new sponsors and thanking those who have been on board for many years, McCook said the IAAF in conjuction with other interantional organisations, were doing a good job to clean up the sport and to make it drug free.
"They can now go back five to six years and put aside those who have cheated," he said.
Port Authority of Jamaica will sponsor the meet's glamour event, the high school boys Class One 4x100m.
The Class One boys 4x100m is one of eight championships events at the 32-year-old meet which is run in memory of Bishop Percival Gibson, the first principal of Kingston College who died in 1970.
The other seven championship events and their sponsors are 4x100m girls Under-19 (Sherwin Williams), 4x800m high school boys' open (Security Admintrators Limited), 4x800m high school girls' open (Grace Kennedy Remittance), 4x400m Institution men (City of Kingston Credit Union), 4x400m high school girls' open (H.D. Hopwood) and the 4x400m high school boys' open (Mead Johnson).
