Watch Lacovia High

Lacovia High School isn’t a track and field powerhouse … yet. However, the school’s athletics programme is growing and as part of that growth, Lacovia High is targeting scholarships for its student-athletes and a possible appearance at the Penn Relays in Philadelphia.

Last year, the Lacovia boys finished 14th at Boys and Girls’ Championships and one of the team’s three coaches says background training for the 2020 season has gone well. “The preparation is going very well, a lot of cut and paste based on the track we have down there but we are basically injury-free this year so I think it is going on very well,” reported coach Cluet Warner recently.

The school’s progress on the track is matched by academic purpose. “That is our main objective at Lacovia, you know, to send the student-athletes on scholarships, so we try to groom them from early. From day one, from grade 9, we make them start to sit the CXCs and to move on to scholarships,” coach Warner explained. “Last year, we had two athletes that are at the University of Technology, Shanamarie Staple and Shanice Brooks,” he said. Staple was fifth at Champs in the 2018 Class One 400m and Brooks is a sprinter-long jumper.

Lacovia might soon have a big 4x400 metres team with Brian Roache, second in the Class Two 400m at Western Champs, Demaro Allen, the Western Champs Class One runner-up and Antowan Robinson, who was third in the Western Class Two 400 metre hurdles forming the core of the team.

Added to that, Lacovia have also the promising Class Two sprinter Jhordane Morgan. “That is the objective because 400m is like the background of our programme,” Warner concurred at Excelsior High School during the Ted Dwyer Memorial.

The school’s speed at 400 metres was on display as Allen topped the Class One standings with a time of 49.52 second with Roach third overall and Morgan in front in Class Two on 53.03 seconds.

Rashieka Byfield, the Class Three 400m winner at Western Champs, was the fastest at the Memorial in 58.71 seconds. Last year, she was eighth at Boys and Girls’ Championships.

Preparations underway

After winning the 200m at Western Champs, Roach reached both Class Two finals at Champs, and the youngster is preparing well for his first year in Class One. “He’s looking so promising, very disciplined in training and he’s going on very well,” the coach informed.

“We have some athletes whom we’re looking for medals or making the finals at Championship and we’re looking for a 4x4oom team to go out there in the finals of Boys and Girls’ Championships,” Warner envisaged.

The first step will be to repeat their strong showing at Western Champs. “We want to take it from there and move it towards the championship and maybe the Penn Relays because we haven’t gone there before. We always went to Miami Classic as a small school but now we’re looking forward now to the Penn Relays,” he revealed.