The celebrated University of the West Indies (UWI) Games returns to the St Augustine Campus in T&T, today after six years, and will feature an estimated 500 athletes across ten disciplines in keen competition.
Four campuses–Mona (Jamaica) Cave Hill (Barbados) St Augustine (T&T) and the Open Campus (satellite learning centre regionally)–were expecting face off at various locations, over eight days (May 21-29) for what is reputed to be the largest tertiary education sports meet in the Caribbean.
Mona was the reigning campus champion. St Augustine, which was nestled in second, was aiming to reverse the former team's fortunes.
The Games were scheduled to begin with an opening ceremony the UWI Sports and Physical Education Centre (Spec) on the grounds of the campus and would feature a women's basketball double header between St Augustine and Cave Hill at 5 and 7 pm.
The Games were free to the public.
Major David Benjamin said citing that the campus did not have all the facilities for staging of the events contained on the roster, the organising committee partnered for the Sports Company of T&T (SporTT) for the staging of track and field events at the Hasely Crawford Stadium; swimming at Marlin Swimming Pool in Westmoorings; while hockey would be played at the Tacarigua Indoor Hockey Facility.
Meanwhile, the Sir Frank Worrell Grounds in St Augustine, will remain as the nerve centre for cricket, while table tennis, tennis, volleyball, basketball and netball will all be played at UWI Spec.
The Games will now feature invitational events in track and field and swimming events which aimed to expand the games without misrepresenting the brand. Invitations for non-UWI students were being issued to attract Olympic hopefuls from different countries. The University of T&T, the College of Science, Technology and Applied Arts of T&T (COSTAATT), University of the Southern Caribbean, as well as, top clubs athletes were being courted.
The track and field invitational would feature competition on the 100m, 400m and 4 by 100m.
"We are trying to push the borders as to what UWI is. It will be an interesting week in terms of the battle of wills. The brandishing talks have already started among the campuses: who is going to do what in which event. St Augustine Campus has traditionally been strong in a number of sporting areas. Other campuses have their strengths. I think the key in these Games is to see which campus turns out the overall successor, the campus that can compete in all of the events at a very high level," Major Benjamin said.
If records were broken at UWI Games, he said, those records stand as country records.