– Games to clash with CAC Juniors
By Tamica Garnett
Following its postponement because of general elections, the Hampton International Games will now be held from July 2 – 4 at the Hasley Crawford Stadium, Trinidad and Tobago.
The event, initially scheduled for this week-end, was postponed owing to the country’s general elections which will be held tomorrow.
The Hampton Games has seen tremendous adjustments since the beginning of the year, when its founder Rawle Raphael, announced, in January, that owing to a lack of sponsorship and time available to sufficiently prepare for the meet, the 35th anniversary of the annual event was being cancelled.
But in a turn of events in March the meet was announced to be back on, this time under the new governance of Noel Hyland in collaboration with sponsorship from the Ministry of Sport and Youth Affairs of Trinidad and Tobago.
Several of Guyana’s top local clubs are looking at attending the meet and have already begun preparations.
Clubs such as Mercury, Ruralites, Royal Youth Movement, Rising Stars, Running Brave, and Enmore Athletics Clubs have all confirmed that they will be attending the elite meet.
Club representatives have admitted that while they were optimistic of having all of their athletes attend the games, the reality is that the size of the touring party was dependent on the availability of funds.
Club officials yesterday stated that while the Athletics Association of Guyana (AAG) freely gave clubs permission to attend the meet, each club is expected to fund the venture on its own.
They stated that monies will be accumulated via fundraising activities and whatever sponsorship the clubs are able to acquire.
The meet, club coaches expressed, was a great opportunity for the athletes to receive exposure to the synthetic track which is the only type of track which is recognized by the international ruling body.
One official said that if an athlete were to break a world record on the grass track used in Guyana, the record would not be recognized.
Club managers said that the change in the nature of the track does leave the athletes at a disadvantage and as such it was vital that the athletes adapt to this type of track if they wanted to go far in the sport.
Consequently, club coaches stated, they try to get the athletes to Trinidad a few days early so that they can familiarize themselves with the track.
The Hampton Games have been rescheduled and will now share the exact same dates as the Central American and Caribbean (CAC) Junior Championships to be held in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.
President of the AAG, Colin Boyce earlier last week had stated that the athletes expected to attend the championships were still to be decided upon since while the individual clubs have deciding control over athletes attendance at the Hampton Games in the case of the CAC Championships the AAG was the ruling body.
A source disclosed that the AAG yesterday held a meeting to deliberate on the issue.
