Kingston College and Wolmer’s High School for Girls will be defending their titles on what is expected to be a day of fireworks when the fourth staging of the Digicel Anthrick Corporate Area Championship takes centre stage at the UWI Usain Bolt Track today.

Kingston College and Wolmer’s High School for Girls will be defending their titles on what is expected to be a day of fireworks when the fourth staging of the Digicel Anthrick Corporate Area Championship takes centre stage at the UWI Usain Bolt Track today.

Action is scheduled to get under way at 9:00 am.

A heavy component of Calabar’s outstanding line-up is also expected to come ablazing, which should add more flavour to what is already a well cooked up meet — the third of the exhilarating five-race Digicel Grand Prix Series.

Ricky Martin, conceptualiser of the event, was beaming at the mouthwatering prospects when revealing that 29 of the 32 Corporate Area schools have so far been confirmed.

“All is set for a great meet and some good clashes; it is going to be a showdown as all the big teams have entered, so the expectation is high,” Martin told the Jamaica Observer.

“As many people would have seen, Calabar has not been fielding a couple of top athletes, but they have registered a team of 57 athletes and, based on feedback, all the big names will be on show,” he added.

That includes Christopher Taylor, the World Youth 400m champion who has been missing in action all season, along with Dejour Russell, last season’s champion boy, plus many others.

They are expected to compete in any of three Grand Prix events, from the 100m to the 400m, which will also include their big rivals in Kingston College’s 100m and 200m sprinter Jhevaughn Matherson.

This meet, according to Martin, will give fans a glimpse of what to expect at the Boys’ and Girls’ Athletics Championships.

“We are doing a development in a Champs format, and based on what I am hearing from the top schools is that they are coming all out. We know based on statistics that the Grand Prix champion on the boy side might very well come from the Corporate Area.“So this year should be exciting, especially the 4x400m relay, which is the last event of the day. This year only the top two teams from each region will be in the Grand Prix 4x400m final, and the Eastern and Western teams are already known and we will have the Corporate Area decider in short order,” Martin explained.

Athletes will contest the full slate of Grand Prix Championship events, which are the 100m, 200m, 400m, 800m, 4x400m, long jump, high jump and discus for classes one and two athletes to put their school in a position to capture the $1-million worth of gym equipment prize.The top two from each Grand Prix Championship event will qualify for the finals, the GC Foster Classics, which will take place at the National Stadium on March 11.

Kamal Powell, senior sponsorship and development Manager of Digicel, expressed pleasure with the build-up of the Grand Prix so far, and is anticipating another extraordinary meet to come.

“We are very happy with the growth that the Grand Prix series has seen. This year, especially, we have seen a drastic improvement in the level of competition as athletes are putting out their best in an effort to be rewarded.

“The Corporate Area meet is where we see the traditional powerhouses in track and field come to play, so I expect that the competition is going to be fierce. Unfortunately we haven’t seen any records broken in any of the eight Grand Prix events so far, but I suspect this will change come Thursday (today),” he said.Meanwhile, along with the Grand Prix events, the 70m, 80m, 100m, 110m hurdles, and the 400m hurdles will be contested. The 1,500m, 3,000m, 4x100m relay and the Medley relay will also be on the track, while the triple jump, discus and javelin will be the other field events.

With Edwin Allen High, Holmwood Technical, St Jago, Hydel High and Vere Technical not eligible for the girls’ section, Wolmer’s High School for Girls should defend their title successfully, but will face strong opposition from the Queen’s School, St Andrew High, Convent of Mercy Alpha, and Immaculate Conception High.

The all-powerful Calabar High, Kingston College and Jamaica College should battle for top honours in the boys’ section.

The champion schools in both sections will pocket $250,000, with $100,000 for the runners-up and $50,000 for the third-placed teams.