PHILADELPHIA, USA — Jamaican high school boys’ teams led by Calabar High, Kingston College and Jamaica College are well set to launch an assault on the Championship of Americas relay titles on today’s final day of the 120th Penn Relays Carnival at Franklin Field in Philadelphia.

Calabar High, who came into the championships as favourites to win at least two events, lead the qualifiers for the 4x800m final and are second to Jamaica College in the qualifiers for the 4x100m, as six Jamaican teams will contest the Championships of Americas final in the short relay.

Six Jamaicans are in the 4x100m final, while four will contest the 4x800m final.

The Jamaicans will contest a third relay today when qualifications of the 4x400m relays will be held this morning with the final set for in the afternoon.

Calabar will be the defending champions in the mile relay, but St Jago High will start favourites with 13 other schools, including St Elizabeth Technical, Jamaica College, former champions Munro College, Holmwood Technical and Wolmer’s Boys, seeking to get into the final set for 5:30 pm (4:30 pm Jamaica time).

Also today, the long jump, triple jump and high jump competitions will be held.

Wolmer’s Boys’ Christoff Bryan will be going after his third Penn Relays watch in the high jump competition and will seek to shake off his second place at the Carifta Games last weekend.

Calabar’s Jabari Fairclough will also take part.

In the absence of Cornwall College’s Odaine Lewis, Jamaica College’s Clayton Brown will start as favourite in the triple jump where Jauvaney Hyde of Wolmer’s Boys and Munro College’s Anthony Bailey will also take part.

Edwin Allen’s Michane Ricketts is the second seed in the long jump where the Kingston College pair of Sharlanjo Nelson and Gavin Gibson are also down to take part.

Yesterday, with the rains that were forecast staying away, but the chill still lingering, the Jamaicans provided some heat with a series of outstanding runs.

Jamaica College must now be considered with an outside shot at the title after running 40.92 seconds, the fastest time of the day, as Jamaican schools occupy the top six positions after the qualifying rounds.

Calabar High ran 41.01 seconds followed by St George’s College (41.03 seconds), Kingston College (41.20 seconds), Wolmer’s Boys (41.24 seconds) and St Jago (41.42 seconds).

Long Beach Poly of California is the top American team with 41.87 seconds, while TC Williams of Virginia will round out the field.

St Elizabeth neighbours and rivals St Elizabeth Technical High and Munro College, as well as Excelsior High and Garvey Maceo High, will contest the Small Schools consolation final just before the main final today.

In the morning’s 4×800 heats, outstanding individual runs from Spalding High’s Kevan Robinson and Calabar’s Rajay Hamilton took the teams to good wins as they set the stage for what could be a close and exciting final today.

Hamilton split 1 minute 53.85 seconds as he took Calabar from fifth place to hand over to Jorel Bellafonte, who ran an easy looking 1 minute 53.95 seconds as the team won in 7 minutes 42.94 seconds, the fastest of the day. Gwayne Porter and Alex Hutton ran the first two legs for Calabar to beat Chaminade of New York.

Spalding trailed in seventh place after the first two legs from Terron Edwards and Delan Dixon, but Robinson ran a splendid 1 minute 53.57 leg to take them to the front giving anchor man Chadoye Dawson a good lead that he never relinquished as they won in 7 minutes 54.39 seconds, ahead of Malvern Prep of Pennsylvania.

Kingston College ran 7 minutes 54.73 seconds to finish ahead of Jamaica College, who ran 7 minutes 55.57 seconds.

Calabar High Boys’ Champs Class One champion Basil Bingham was second in the discus throw with 59.83m behind Lynchburg’s Mathew Zajac (61.20m) with Jamaica College’s Alec-Verne Longmore third with 55.08m.