The country’s top urban area high schools are set to match stride on today’s opening day of the Anthrick Corporate Area Track and Field Championships at the National Stadium. Start time is 8:00 am.

Over 30 finals will be contested on the opening day of the highly anticipated two-day championships. Kingston College (KC) are defending boys’ champions while Excelsior hold the girls’ title.

Among the finals to be contested today are the 100 metres for boys and girls in all classes.

KC won last year’s championships after amassing 507.50 points. They were ahead of JC (427 points), Calabar High (335.50), Wolmer’s Boys’ (148.50), and Excelsior High (132).

Leaford Grant, head coach of KC, said his boys are ready and raring to go.

“We are going there as usual to give a good representation of ourselves,” said Grant.

“The boys are feeling fine, but as usual we have one and two little niggles, but we are trying to manage the process with these youngsters and so we should be okay and hopefully, we should win the championships,” he said.

On the girls’ side, Excelsior tallied 429 points to win the title last year, ahead of Immaculate (315.50), Wolmer’s Girls (248), The Queen’s School (224) and St Andrew High (104).

David Riley, head coach of Excelsior, said he is very confident that they will defend their title this year.

“We are confident, but not overly confident, so we are very prepared because I think we have a strong team and we have every intention to retain the Corporate Area title on the girls’ side,” said Riley. “Our athletes are very motivated and they are focused on accomplishing that task,” he said.

However, Riley added that he is expecting a tough challenge from all the other schools at the championships.

“Corporate is a tough meet for us because it has come down to the last race one year and so we are prepared for that,” he said.

Franz Ford, coach of Immaculate, whose team swept the 100m at last year’s championships, said he is very upbeat about his team’s chances going into the event.

“The girls are pretty confident in what they are about to deliver,” said Ford. “We had to be very tactical and very technical in how we carried out our business this season and I am sure that with God’s blessings and God’s grace that the girls will definitely go out there and deliver a performance like no other,” he said.

Ricky Martin, chief organiser of the event, said this year’s meet is expected to produce a number of record-breaking performances based on what he has seen from other schools at various development meets across the island.

“The expectations are very high, especially in the boys’ section where KC are the defending champions, and so we do expect good competition from them [also considering] what they did at the Gibson Relays in Class One. KC’s Bouwahjgie Nkrumie is the defending 100m champion and we are expecting to come out and lower the record in this event.

“Both days should be really exciting because most of the teams use this meet as a measuring stick to gauge their performances against the schools from the Corporate Area,” Martin added.