Rusea’s girls in pole position

Western Bureau :

Rodrick Myles, the coach of Rusea’s High’s track and field team, is confident they will be able to defend their Western Championships girls’ title on today’s final day of competition at the St Elizabeth Technical (STETHS) Sports Complex in Santa Cruz.

After nine field events finals on Thursday, Rusea’s lead with 91 points from STETHS (68). They are followed by Petersfield (49), Manning (47) and Mt Alvernia rounding out the top five.

“I think this might be one of our easiest of the past two championships that we have won,” Myles said.

“Going into the final day as you can see we totally dominated the sprints and we also look good in the distances so I think this will be one of our better championships,” he added.

Despite having immense confidence in his track athletes, Myles is not promising anything spectacular especially from his sprinters and said that the ISSA/GraceKennedy Boys and Girls’ Championships is their primary focus.

However, he expects good performances from Shantae Morgan (12.66 and 25.17 in the Class Two 100 and 200m, respectively) and Lashawn Haye (11.86 in the Class One 100m preliminary). “You can expect great things from them. One of the athletes I think people could look out also for is Monique Stewart who has done 12.67 and 26.08 in the 100 and 200m respectively, in Class Four. She was a gold medallist at primary champs last year,” Myles added.

Good in the field

Myles was also impressed with the overall performances of his senior field athletes and singled out record breakers Shamella Donaldson in the Class One discus and Nia Robinson in the Class Two high jump.

“The throws team is one of the best among high schools in the country with two national representatives, two have won medals at Champs already,” Myles said.

“Donaldson has done a great job with her throw of 48.85m. She is the leading high school thrower this season after a 49m plus throw earlier this season. Robinson has also done well with her record leap of 1.76m in the Class Two high jump record,” he added.

Alisha Shaw took the Class One discus with 12.83m on her last throw ahead of twin sister Keliesha (12.48m) to grab maximum points for Rusea’s. Judeen Aird of Petersfield took bronze with 12.05m.In the boys’ section Petersfield leads with 99.5 points going into the final day, followed by STETHS on 91. Cornwall College (74), Rusea’s (45.5) and Herbert Morrison (19) round out the top five.