2009 Boys and Girls Champs Buzz Building

Track and field has always been big in Jamaica but with the performance of Jamaica athletes in recent years, culminating in our sprint domination in Beijing last year track and field is rising even higher.

A little History

Almost 100 years ago when Jamaica was still a British colony 6 local high schools started competing in track and field events, fast forward to the present and over 100 schools and thousands of high school students between 12 and 18 now compete in one of the biggest yearly track and field events in the world. Most of the members of Jamaica’s current track team were stars on the track from their high school days at champs including the world’s fastest man Usain Bolt who was then a 400m runner.

over 30,000 spectators pack the National Stadium each
year to watch Jamaica’s future Track and Field Stars

International Spotlight

International press have been flooding into the island since the Beijing  Olympics to cover Jamaican athletes and Champs being one of the major events on the local track and field calendar is expected to attract a lot of international attention.

Asafa Powell handing out prizes at last year’s champs – Remember the
name of the sprinter Ramone McKenzie, he has great potential

In 2009 title sponsors GraceKennedy present the Boys’ and Girls’ Championships and I’ll be there on the final day (champs is from April 1-4 this year) cheering on my high school team Calabar High School who are favorite to win for the boys section for the third consecutive year.