Edwin Allen Class Ones to drive Gibson McCook excitement
Published:Sunday | February 20, 2022 | 12:07 AMRaymond Graham - Gleaner Writer
AFTER A year’s absence, the very popular Gibson McCook Relays, the 45th staging, will return this Saturday inside the National Stadium with a new format, a package lasting just over four hours with finals only, starting at 1 p.m., with the high school girls’ 4x100m.
For the first time in nearly two years, local fans will get a chance to cheer on athletes at a local meet, as the Government recently gave the approval for 10,000 spectators. These fortunate fans are very lucky as they are about to witness something extra special, and for sure they will want to be present for the first event as Edwin Allen High school quartet of twin sisters, Tia and Tina Clayton, along with Serena Cole and Brandy Hall, look set to rewrite the history books in the high school 4x100-metre relay.
Two years ago, in Class II, the quartet wrote their names in those history books, producing the fastest time ever, breaching the 44-second barrier twice.
At the Central Championships at G.C. Foster College in early March, the quartet stopped the clock at 43.80 seconds for the first sub-44-second clocking ever, and a few weeks later at ‘Champs’ they went even faster, winning in 43.74 seconds.
Those two times marked the fifth time an Edwin Allen quartet of any class was going sub-44 seconds. In 2014 at the UTech Classics, a team led by Christania Williams clocked 43.95 seconds. Three years later, the Clarendon school broke the Penn Relays record after winning in 43.96 seconds, then two years later, they bettered that record with a 43.62-second clocking, the fastest time ever by a high school female team. The quartet included Kevona Davis, Tia and Tina Clayton, and Serena Cole.
CAN THEY BREAK THE RECORD?
The big question that will be on everyone lips on Saturday will be if this foursome can obliterate that record and go sub-43 seconds. This is not beyond the Michael Dyke-coached quartet, as Cole and the Clayton twins were part of a Jamaica team that created history last summer in Narobi, Kenya, at the World Under-20 Championships after a zippy World Junior record 42.94 seconds to win the gold medal.
Hall, a second-year Class I athlete, will now team up once again with her teammates who are entering the Class for the first time, and Hall is definitely faster than Hydel High Kerrica Hall, who was on that record-breaking team in Kenya.
All indications are pointing to something very special as the high school record of 43.62 seconds should go, but the National Junior record, done in Nairobi, will be safe as Hall, who will be 20 years old this year, will not be eligible as a junior.
The four gave a teaser recently at the Western Relays at G.C. Foster College. Running without any competition, the quartet stopped the clock at a record 44.31 seconds, a time which is also quicker than the Gibson McCook Relays Class I record of 44.48 seconds set by a St Jago High quartet in 2014.
With the record holders, along with Hydel and St Catherine high schools hoping to push the Edwin Allen quartet, the occasion will be right for a special moment.