THE opening day of the 39th staging of the Institute of Sports (INSPORTS) Eastern Regional Primary Schools Track and Field Championships got off to a very late and confusion-marred start as a result of registration bungling among other issues at National Stadium East yesterday.

This led to numerous complaints by school officials, coaches, meet officials, and even spectators during the near two-hour delay. Though the meet got under way minutes to midday, with just over half an hour after the start, it was abruptly aborted without adequate explanation with the completion of just the girls’ Class One 400m heats and five of the eight boys’ Class One 400m heats, while the boys’ high jump Open and the girls’ cricket ball throw Open were in progress.

The meet which was slated to begin at 10:00 am was set to resume at 3:00 pm but rain delayed that restart by a little over half an hour.

It was called off at 6:05 pm with only 10 of the 32 events slated for the day completed.

The championships continue today starting at 10:00 am.

Twelve finals were scheduled to be completed today but it is uncertain how that will unfold considering that there are 22 events to be made up from yesterday’s schedule.

Meanwhile, Khalil Marshall from Half-Way-Tree Primary ran the fastest time in the Class One boys’ 400m heats with a time of 1:00.61 minutes, followed by Kiwayne Wint from Louise Bennett-Coverly with 1:00.86, Tyler Ferguson from Holy Rosary with 1:00.86, and Donte Mendez from George Headley with 1:02.17.

Kelly-Ann Carr from Rock Hall has the fastest time of 1:02.78 minutes going into the girls’ 400m open semi-finals to be run today. The second fastest time done was by Tiandra Patterson from Windward Road with 1:02.79, and Shevaughn Thomas from Lyssons Primary with 1:03.88.

In the preliminary rounds of the boys’ high jump open, the 16 finalists for the today finished with 1.35 metres each.