Sport

Holmwood on the double

ian allen - Holmwood's Younne Hopkins

The Championship events at Saturday's Gibson Relays will be hot. Teams will be competing for souvenir watches and bragging rights.

High schools will also be gunning for the psychological edge ahead of the March 16-19 VMBS Boys and Girls Championships. From today until Saturday Star Sports will present previews of the eight Championship events. Today we look at the Class One boys and girls 4x100m.

THE HIGH SCHOOL girls' Class One sprint relay at Saturday's Gibson Relays is expected to be a thriller.

Anyone of three quality teams, St. Jago, Holmwood and Vere Technical can take home the Sherwin Williams-sponsored Trophy.

However, on performances so far, Holmwood should prevail over St. Jago and Vere.

At the Mile Western Relays, Vere (47.40 seconds) defeated Holmwood (47.83). However, St. Jago were in $100,000 winning form at the Camperdown Classics the same day, taking that event in 46.50.

St. Jago also ran 46.64 at the Queens/Grace Jackson Meet at Stadium East.

According to Holmwood's coach Maurice Wilson, his team was below strength as Anneisha McLaughlin was the only regular starter on the 4x100m team at Western Relays

Despite that, the quartet of Kadian Beckford, Jerine Bolt, Megan Reid and McLaughlin was able to run Vere to the line at Catherine Hall Sports Complex.

Vere had the same quartet, Angella Graham, Tashi Lewin, Inderia Spence and Shana-Kay Wright at South Central Champs, but Holmwood 'super trio' of Sonia Sutherland, Rose-Marie White, and Nyoka Cole returned to join McLaughlin to clock an impressive winning time of 45.9.

St. Jago's best time this season, 46.50, came from the quartet of Kaydene Mason, Nickoda Patterson, Jhennel Brown and Sudain Davis at the Camperdown Classics where they defeated St. Andrew (49.22) and Queen's (51.43).

'Best' runners

However, with Holmwood 'best' runners, Sutherland, Cole and White to join McLaughlin, coach Wilson believes it is action time.

"With the inclusion of those three (girls), I am thinking about the record (Gibson Relays) ... once we can change the baton properly," a confident Wilson said.

St. Jago's coach Raymond 'KC' Graham will let his girls do the talking on Saturday. When contacted, he declined comment on the likely outcome of the race.
For Vere, coach Dwayne Jarrett sees the Gibson Relays as just a part of his build-up for the inter-secondary championships next month.

"The Gibson Relays is not one of our major focuses. We are going to use it again as preparation for Girls' Champs, so we will be feeling out different teams."

He believes Holmwood will win. "Based on how the season is going, I think Holmwood have the best team... we should be in the top three though."