The Tribune

FOR the first time, St Augustine’s College made it to the Championships of America round for high school girls at the world renowned Penn Relays Carnival.

And the same thing happened for the high school boys from Moore’s Island.

SAC, using Devynne Charlton, Makeya White, Dannielle Gibson and Keianna Albury, ran 47.58sec to finish in seventh place. They clocked 46.60sec to set a new championships record in the Scotiabank National High School Championships.

There were some 617 schools in this division so it tells how significant the performance of St Augustine’s was.

This race was won by Holmwood Tech of Jamaica in 44.82sec.

Moore’s Island ran 3:15.43 in the semifinals. In that race,Nicholas Roberts ran 51.2sec to lead off. Whitsun Bain took the baton and ran 51.4sec. Steven Gardiner ran 47.0sec on the third leg and James Williams finished in an amazing 46.7sec.

In the final on Saturday, the team placed seventh in 3:23.10.

Calabar out of Jamaica won in 3:09.22 with Munroe College just two hundredths of a second behind in 3:09.24.

Calabar’s Jovan Francis ran 44.8sec and moved away from Munroe’s Delano Williams on the final leg. Williams clocked 44.9.

Francis was the BTC 2013 CARIFTA Games silver medallist in the under-20 boys 400m and Williams, from Turks and Caicos, was last year’s World junior champion in the 200m.

Bahamian schools have attended the Penn Relays for years but in 2010 the BAAA decided to support the teams that won either the 4x100m or 4x400m relay at the National High School Track and Field Championships.

The performances of SAC and Moore’s Island this year shows that the investment is now beginning to earn dividends.