“ST. JAGO HIGH- OUT OF THE MONEY”

Photo: St.Jago 4x100m Class 1 Boys

The Monk Street based track and field powerhouse and 2015 championship contenders St Jago High will not be able to participate in the final of the inaugural Digicel Athletic Grand Prix 2015, after their respective teams were no shows at the recently held Central Championship.

The Grand Prix Series kicked started at the 18th staging of the Youngster Goldsmith Classics in February, the first of seven events and is set to culminate at the GC Foster College Classics on March 14 inside the National Stadium.

The events being contested in the series are the 100m , 200m ,400m, 800m, 4x400m, Long Jump and Discuss Throw.

The top 8 athletes (top two from Central and Western and top four from corporate area) will be selected from the three regions to compete in the finals.

The St. Jago team was a no show at the Central Championships in which they normally dominate in most of the selected events. News came on the eve of the Central Championships that both teams had withdrawn from the meet at Kirkvine Manchester to the detriment of their chances of claiming top prize in the series.

Both team coaches gave opposite reasons for their non participation with Girls coach Keilando Goburn, citing injury precautions and avoiding a recurrence at last year’s event which affected their chances at Champs.

Head coach for the Boys, Danny Hawthrone revealed that he gave instructions to his management to enter a squad for the meet but other personnel within their school’s management thought the guys were too tired to participate at the event.

The Boys’ coach is of the view that withstanding the fact of their non-participation at the Central Championships, their performances at the previous events on the calendar should have given his athletes passage to the event finale, since the school was allowed to participate at that meet among other corporate area schools.

St Jago has been among the top contenders in events such as the female 200m, and 4*400 relays.

The top schools have been gunning for top prizes including $1million worth of gym equipment along with several individual prizes in the meets held thus far.

Now track and field fans will anxiously wait to see if good sense will prevail and the school from the old capital gets the green light to grace the track at the event finale.