Hydel coach backs Lyston to go fast
Published:Sunday | February 20, 2022 | 12:11 AMRobert Bailey - Gleaner Writer
HYDEL HIGH School’s head coach Corey Bennett says his charge, Brianna Lyston, is in excellent shape to lower her personal best time in the 200m this season.
Bennett made the comment after Lyston, a former St Jago athlete, destroyed a competitive field to win the girls’ Class One 200 metres at the JAAA/Puma Development Series at the National Stadium yesterday, in an impressive 23.27 seconds.
Running into a negative headwind of 2.0 metres per second, Lyston comfortably won the event ahead of St Catherine High School’s Danielle Kent (25.19) and Janel Baxter running unattached (25.68).
Bennett told The Gleaner he was very impressed with Lyston’s performance and therefore is expecting her to run well below her personal best time of 23.18 seconds pretty soon.
“I thought she executed well because we had some good athletes in the field and this is just another step for her aim this year,” said Bennett.
“Her PR (personal best) is still 23.1 and this time that she has run is not far from it, and we are hoping that she will be able to achieve it before the season is over and we just wish her all the best,” he said.
TOUGH SEASON
Hydel finished second in the ISSA Boys and Girls’ Championships in 2020, and third in 2021. Bennett added that they have been having a tough season so far, because of a number of injuries to their senior athletes, and therefore his athletes are taking some time to come into their own.
“It has been an up-and-down season so far, because we had two major accidents with two of our major athletes, which happens to be my two sons who both had fractures two days apart and so kind of threw off the team a little bit,” said Bennett.
“However, we trust God and we believe in the process, and we know that he makes no mistakes and we are just hoping that the team sticks together and just achieves what we set out to achieve this season,” he said.
In other results from the meet, St Jago’s Safhia Hinds won the girls’ 400-metre hurdles open in 59.64 seconds ahead of Hydel’s Oneika McAnuff, 1:00.01 seconds and Dejona Simpson from Excelsior, 1:00.62 seconds, while Britannia Johnson of Camperdown captured the girls Class One discus event with a mark of 48.65m in front of her teammate Britannie Johnson, 45.70m, and Breanna Monieth of BB Coke, 32.64m.
At the McKenley-Wint Track and Field Classic, another meet held yesterday at the Calabar High School, Lyston’s rival, Edwin Allen’s Tina Clayton clocked 11.76 seconds to emerge as the overall winner of the girls’ Class One 100m. Her twin sister Tia was second overall in a time of 11.82 seconds, while third went to The Queen’s School’s Gabrielle Matthews, who clocked 12.35 seconds.
On the boys’ side, St Elizabeth Technical’s Orlando Wint was the winner of the Class One 100m with a time of 10.85 seconds. Second went to Dominic Williams, who ran unattached in 10.96 seconds, and third was Adrian Kerr from Kingston College (10.98).
Calabar’s Mark Manley took home the boys’ Class One 400m event in a time of 49.99 seconds, ahead of the Port Antonio pair of Najay Mickiel (50.45) and Wayne McGregor (50.47).