The 89 schools participating in this year’s staging of the annual Insports Primary Schools Athletics Championships will receive at least three pairs of PUMA running spikes each.

Minister of sport Olivia Grange donated 400 pairs of spikes to the schools during the launch of the 38th staging of the event inside the National Indoor Sports Centre at Independence Park yesterday.

Grange, who was the keynote speaker at the event, announced that the four-day championship had been sponsored to the tune of $10 million and that the winning school would receive $200,000 worth of gears and equipment, the second-place school will receive the equivalent of $150,000, third-place team $100,000 and from fourth to 10th would receive $50,000 worth of gears and equipment.

A total of 2,890 athletes are registered to participate at the championships which gets going on Wednesday, May 9, at 8:00 am. The meet will begin at the same time on the Thursday and Friday, but will start at 10:00 am on the Saturday, with the latter being set aside for finals only.

St Albans Primary and Melrose Primary are the new schools, which up until last year, participated in the Insports Junior High, All-Age and Primary Championships, a meet that had its last staging last month.

“We have seen plans rolled out for the Jamaica International Invitational Meet, which will feature some of the top athletes in Jamaica and in the world, at the National Stadium in a couple of weeks and then today we launch a meet which will feature some of the youngest athletes in our country.

“We will be exposed to potential realised at the same time as getting glimpses of the emerging potential. To me it represents a happy state of affairs that we are getting the opportunity to see within just a few days some of today’s star athletes and some of those who will be tomorrow’s stars,” she noted.

Grange spoke of some of the athletes who have performed at the Primary Champs and have gone on to win medals at the international level for Jamaica.

“The championships have proven to be a very important development meet for many athletes in the likes of World and Olympic 100m gold medallist Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, Olympic and World 400m hurdles champion Melaine Walker, Olympic bronze medallist Warren Weir, Carifta Games Under-17 200m champion and record holder Jazeel Murphy… Javion Francis is also a product,” she outlined.

Olympian Francis, who attended the launch, spoke of his early days in track and field.

“I ran at Primary Champs, but I was not a great star then. Over the years I told myself that I must run for Jamaica and make my mom proud and make my country proud of me and I live to see my dream come true.

“I just want to say to the young athletes here today, only the best is good enough, so just keep on working hard. and coaches, just guide and protect these young athletes,” he said.

He also shared how it was for him, the first time he ran at the National Stadium.

“The first time I got a spikes I looked at my coach and said ‘coach what is this?’… because I was not used to running in spikes. I remember the first time running at the stadium, I said to myself, ‘wow, this is a big place, what am I gonna do?’ My coach said, ‘just go out there and have fun’ and I just went out there and had fun,” he said, triggering a bout of laughter from the audience.

Naggo Head are the defending champions and will start favourites to retain their title.

— Dwayne Richards