New BSSAC format to return

A separate meet for field events will be held again when the Barbados Secondary Schools’ Athletic Championships (BSSAC) jumps off in 2024.

This was disclosed today by meet director Dave Small, who said the decision to have three days dedicated strictly to field events had worked out well.

For the first time ever, the field events were held at Harrison College from March 13 to 15, as the National Stadium was no longer an option and the Usain Bolt Sports Complex was unable to cater to certain field events.

“The Usain Bolt Complex is not friendly for every field event… we can’t do the javelin, we can’t do the discus and then the runway has some issues. This meant the triple jump for the seniors was not necessarily the easiest thing to do,” Small explained.

During the three days of competition, the javelin, discus, shot put, long jump and triple jump events from all the participating schools in the 2023 Powerade-Dasani BSSAC were held, with the points to be added to the zone results as well as the overall standings.

In an interview with Barbados TODAY, Small said everything went “relatively well” despite some teething problems on the first two days.

He disclosed that on the second day the long jump started late “because of infrastructural work, but otherwise I thought it went pretty well.”

The meet director admitted that some tweaking could be done to enhance the format.

However, Small said that having the field events on separate days provided an opportunity for those athletes to have their time in the limelight.

He said normally the track events overshadowed those on the field.

“This also gave the schools the opportunity to use some of their best athletes as the tight turnaround and rest factor when the track was married with the field events in a compact program was no longer an issue,” Small said.

“So it worked out well. We were backed into a corner but you know, the show must go on.”

Small further pointed out that hosting the field events at Harrison College gave them the opportunity to add the triple jump to the zonal meets.

With the return to the full format for the first time since the Covid-19 Pandemic, Small said while he did not expect a lot of records to be broken, he was still happy with the quality and standard of the performances by the athletes.

He said plans were already in the works to improve the current format, but with things still to be finalized he was not at liberty to disclose those plans at this time.
(CG)