St Elizabeth Technical High School (STETHS) retained both titles on Saturday’s final day of the County of Cornwall Athletics Association Western Championships at GC Foster College in contrasting fashion.

While the Dwayne Jarrett-led girls’ team led from Wednesday’s first day, going on to score a big 100-plus points win, the boys’ team, under the guidance of Neil Harrison, engineered a pulsating late drive to beat William Knibb Memorial by 28 points in a 333.5 to 305.5 victory.

Harrison, who led Munro College to several Boys’ titles before moving to Kingston College and then Jamaica College where he had big successes, announced, “I am back in the west,” after STETHS took over the lead late on Saturday after trailing by half a point going into the relays and a handful of events left.

STETHS came into the day in third place in the boys’ competition, on 89 points, trailing Munro College — 131.5 points and pre-championships favourites William Knibb — 89.5.

They took full advantage of the big points on offer in the relays, finishing ahead of William Knibb Memorial (305.5) in all six relays to finish with 333.5 points. First day leaders Munro College were third with 270.5, Cornwall College fourth with 220 and Herbert Morrison Technical fifth with 205.

After leading by just 22 points after the first day, the STETHS females continued to extend their lead all day, finally ending with 358 points. Mt Alvernia High retained their second place from last year with 254 points and William Knibb Memorial (186) were third, replacing Petersfield High (125), who were fourth and Maggotty High were fifth with 90 points, one place better than last year.

Harrison said they were not surprised that they were able to overtake William Knibb at the end and it was due to sound planning in all facets of the competition.

“We had a meeting with the boys and we went through all the results and we strategised,” he said. “We knew William Knibb have been doing well all season. We know where our shortcomings were, but I pretty much strategised in terms of all the relays, relay wins are 12 points and we ensured we were in good nick where the relays were concerned and the team delivered and gave us the cushion we needed, along with some field events.”

“From inception, I realised that the team is a very young one and if you noticed we did not have any athletes dominating, we had to double up for the most part, which is quite demanding for this kind of a championship. But we had to show some grit, some tenacity. We are the defending champions, and we decided that we are not going to go down without a fight,” he added.

There were a number of outstanding performances at the championships, including a World Under-20 leading 50.82 seconds in the Class One boys’ 400m hurdles from Herbert Morrison Technical’s Trevoy Smith.

William Knibb Memorial’s World Under-20 representative Jabari Matheson ran a personal best 46.60 seconds to break the Boys’ Class One 400m record of 47.26 seconds set in 2011 by Waynee Hyman of Munro College.

Sawayne Kerr of STETHS was second in 47.41 seconds and last year’s winner Mario Birch of Cornwall College was third in 47.47 seconds, both personal best performances.

Maggotty High’s Yoshane Bowen won the Boys’ Class One 800m in a sublime 1:51.88 seconds, improving on the 1:53.78 seconds he ran a week earlier at the Camperdown Classic.

Maggotty High’s Zachary Wallace surprised a strong field to win the Boys’ Class One 100m, running 10.61 seconds into a strong head wind of -3.8 metres per second, beating last year’s Class Two champion and pre-race favourite Tavaine Stewart of Herbert Morrison, who ran 10.79 seconds and Mickoy Curtis of Munro College 10.89 seconds.

Last year’s winner Tramaine Todd of STETHS finished fifth and Muschett High’s Johan-Ramaldo Smythe, who was a medal favourite, was sixth.

Munro College’s Demar Robinson, who was disqualified last year, won the 3,000m run for Classes 3 and 4 boys’ in 10 minutes 27.25 seconds, faster than the 10:52.50 seconds set last year by STETHS’ Dejaun Gray.

Final boys’ points:

STETHS-333.5, William Knibb Memorial-305.5, Munro College- 270.5, Cornwall College- 220, Herbert Morrison Technical-205, Petersfield High-102, Maggotty High-76, Lacovia High- 56, BB Coke High-46, Sydney Pagon High-41, Green Island High-33, Frome Technical-31, Rusea’s High-30, Mannings School-27, Rhodes Hall High-22.5, Muschett High-22, Maldon High- 11, Black River High-10, Irwin High- 6, Godfrey Stewart High- 4, Anchovy High-3, Albert Town Hugh-3, Belmont Academy-3, Cedric Titus-1

Final girls’ points:

STETHS- 358, Mt Alvernia High- 254, William Knibb Memorial- 186, Petersfield High-125, Maggotty High-90, Lacovia High-79, Black River High-72, Muschett High-64, Mannings School-64, Sydney Pagon-56, Green Island-44, Rhodes Hall High-35, BB Coke High-31, Rusea’s High-28, Godfrey Stewart-25, Albert Town High-21, Frome Technical-19, Maldon High-19, Green Pond High-8, St James High-5, Anchovy High-5, Cedric Titus-3