MVP Track Club headliners, 100m world record-holder Asafa Powell and Sherone Simpson, will open their track & field season in the customary fashion, running the 400m at the Queen's/Grace Jackson Meet at the Stadium East today.

2005 World Championships 100m silver medallist Michael Frater, 400m hurdler Melaine Walker, 2003 World Championships 100m silver medallist Darrel Brown of Trinidad & Tobago and Britain's Germaine Mason will be the other MVP athletes on show.

They will be joined by Olympic 4x100m gold medallist Aleen Bailey and Anneisha McLaughlin.

Powell, who won a bronze medal in the 100m at the IAAF World Championships in Osaka, Japan, last year, is expected to don the first prototype of a pair of running spikes designed specifically for the athlete by sports gear manufacturers Nike to compete in at the Beijing Olympics this August.

MVP club president Bruce James told Sporting World that the shoe, which was prepared by Nike's technical team using an imprint of Powell's foot, will be the lightest and strongest ever made by the company.

Nike stipulated that the spikes could not be shown publicly until Powell makes his debut at today's meet.
St Jago coach, Danny Hawthorne, told Sporting World that national junior 100m record holder (10.11s) Yohan Blake will also make his season's debut at today's Queen's/Grace Jackson meet at Stadium East.

Meanwhile, over 2,000 athletes from schools, including Boys' and Girls' champions Calabar and Holmwood, Kingston College and Wolmer's, will compete in the 200m, 400m, 800m, high jump, triple jump, 400m hurdles, 4x100m, and 4x400m.

World Youth champion Dexter Lee in the meantime, is expected to be among those competing at the 21st renewal of the St Elizabeth (STETHS) Invitational track and field meeting, also to be held today at the school grounds in Santa Cruz.

Western and southern Jamaica's top schools, including Holmwood, Manchester, Edwin Allen, Vere, Munro, will join athletes from Wolmer's, St Hugh's and Kingston College, competing in the long jump, high jump, discus, shot put, 400m hurdles, 100m, 400m, 800m, 1,500m, 4x400m, and 4x800m.

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