It’s down to the last lap for the 2011 Powerade Barbados Secondary Schools’ Athletic Championships.
Last week Wednesday through Friday, hundreds of Barbadian athletes laid the groundwork at the National Stadium for what is expected to be two highly competitive days of finals.
Eleven records have already been broken and tomorrow and Friday, the atmosphere will simply be electric as hundreds of students and the general public are expected to fill the facility to capacity, spurring athletes to do even better.
More records are expected to fall, especially in the Under-15 division. Tamal Atwell of The Lodge School got the most favourable conditions to break Obadele Thompson’s record (11.25) in the 100 metres, racing to 11.16 seconds.
Competition will come from Mario Burke of Harrison College and Combermere’s Ramarco Thompson who has broken two records to date with 1.87m in the high jump and 39.27 seconds in the 300-metre hurdles.
In addition to the easily recognized names like Anthonio Mascoll of Ellerslie; Springer’s Akela Jones and Tristan Evelyn and Jerrad Mason of Harrison College, some new faces have emerged in the lower divisions.
Cristanna McConney has made a seamless transition to represent Queen’s College as has Tianna Bowen of The Lester Vaughan School and St George’s Mary Fraser. Ryan Vickers of Queen’s College and Shasamani Kellman of Foundation have also impressed.
Springer Memorial and St Leonard’s Boys’ have the lead among the girls and boys, respectively and all of the other schools will be coming after them.