T&T's lead­ing ath­letes Jereem Richards, Keshorn Wal­cott and Michelle-Lee Ahye are set to star at the Na­tion­al Gas Com­pa­ny Na­tion­al As­so­ci­a­tion of Ath­let­ic Ad­min­is­tra­tions of T&T (NGC-NAAATT) Na­tion­al Open Cham­pi­onships on Sat­ur­day and Sun­day.

The ac­tion is set to un­fold at the new­ly re­fur­bished Hase­ly Craw­ford Sta­di­um in Mu­cu­rapo, Port-of-Spain, start­ing to­day from 2 pm and con­tin­u­ing to­mor­row at 3 pm.

Spec­ta­tors are in for a treat as Richards, who has been thriv­ing on the in­ter­na­tion­al cir­cuit this sea­son, will face the starter in the men's 200 me­tres to­mor­row af­ter­noon. The two-time Com­mon­wealth Games 200m cham­pi­on and the 2022 World In­doors 400m win­ner will line up in heat one of three in the pre­lim­i­nar­ies.

Al­so com­pet­ing in the dash are three mem­bers from the sil­ver-medal win­ning 4x100m re­lay team at the 2022 Com­mon­wealth Games in Birm­ing­ham, Eng­land, in­clud­ing Jerod El­cock, Er­ic Har­ri­son and Kyle Greaux. El­cock and Har­ri­son will race in heat two and Greaux in the fi­nal heat.

This evening though, Wal­cott will be go­ing af­ter his sev­enth con­sec­u­tive na­tion­al ti­tle in the men's javelin event. The two-time Olympic medal­list, who en­ters with a gold from the re­cent Cen­tral Amer­i­can and Caribbean Games, is com­pet­ing un­at­tached and will be chal­lenged by five oth­ers in­clud­ing Ethan Ado­nis of Tigers Ath­let­ics, Point Fortin New Jets duo An­tho­ny Di­az and Do­ri­an Charles, Cameron Seaton (Un­at­tached) and Le Bron James (To­ba­go Fal­cons).

Ahye, T&T's cel­e­brat­ed women's sprint­er, will chase the sprint dou­ble. She will line up in both the women's 100m and 200m, so too, two-time youth "Sports­woman of the Year" Shani­qua Bas­combe.

Ac­cord­ing to a re­lease from the NAAATT: "This week­end’s event is sig­nif­i­cant in many ways. It will de­ter­mine our na­tion­al cham­pi­ons; it pro­vides a fi­nal op­por­tu­ni­ty for the ath­letes who have not yet at­tained the qual­i­fi­ca­tion stan­dards for the up­com­ing World Ath­let­ics Cham­pi­onships to do so; it will as­sist the as­so­ci­a­tion in team se­lec­tion; and it al­lows fans to see the best of our ath­letes. More im­por­tant­ly, this year our Open Cham­pi­onships serve as 'the hard test', a mea­sure of how well-pre­pared we are to host the ath­let­ics seg­ment of the Com­mon­wealth Youth Games. The event will be like a fi­nal dress re­hearsal when it is ex­pect­ed that all sys­tems will be func­tion­al and run­ning smooth­ly."

Sev­er­al of the ju­nior ath­letes, who com­pet­ed suc­cess­ful­ly at this year's Carif­ta Games and at the re­cent North Amer­i­can, Cen­tral Amer­i­can and Caribbean (NACAC) Un­der-18 and U-23 Cham­pi­onships held last week­end in Cos­ta Ri­ca, will be join­ing the se­nior ath­letes.

There are al­so in­ter­na­tion­al races card­ed this week­end. Murielle Ahoure Demps of Ivory Coast will fea­ture in the women's 100m in­ter­na­tion­al dash ver­sus Jas­min Abrams (Un­at­tached), Halle Haz­zard of Grena­da and Liberia's Symone Dar­ius to­day.

The en­trance fee is $100 dai­ly.

Sched­ule

To­day

Morn­ing ses­sion

Men ham­mer throw

Af­ter­noon ses­sion

Women 400m pre­lims

Men 400m pre­lims

Women 100m pre­lims

Men 100m Int'l pre­lims

Women dis­cus

Men high jump

Men shot put

Women long jump

Men 100m pre­lims

Women 1,500m

Men 1,500m

Men 110m hur­dles

Evening ses­sion

Men triple jump

Men javelin

Men 1,600m mas­ters mile

Women 100m mas­ters

Men 100m mas­ters 50+

Women 100m Int'l

Women 100m fi­nals

Men 100m Int'l fi­nals

Men 100m fi­nals

Women 400m fi­nals

Men 400m Int'l fi­nals

Men 400m fi­nals

To­mor­row

Af­ter­noon ses­sion

Men Dis­cus

Women high jump

Men long jump

Women shot put

Women 200m pre­lims

Women 200m mas­ters

Women 200m Int'l

Men 200m Int'l pre­lims

Men 200m pre­lims

Women 400m hur­dles

Men 400m hur­dles

Men 5,000m

Evening ses­sion

Women javelin

Women triple jump

Women pole vault

Men pole vault

Women 800m

Men 800m

Men 200m 35-39 mas­ters

Men 200m Int'l fi­nals

Women 200m fi­nals

Men 200m fi­nals

Women 4x400m re­lay

Men 4x400m re­lay

Women 4x100m re­lay

Men 4x100m re­lay