High spirits and good weather prevailed at the 2015 NSATIS Athletics meet held in Launceston on Wednesday 23rd September.  Many events were dominated by St Patrick’s College leaving them with an almost clean sweep of the shields on offer.  Strong performances from the Grammar Junior boys prevented this and they took home the Junior Boys trophy.  St Patrick’s also took home 7 of the 10 age group pennants – winning all 5 girl’s pennants.  Three boys pennants went to other schools:  u/13 to Grammar, u/15 to Marist Regional College and Open to a strong Scotch Oakburn group.

A number of records were broken on the day with the highlight coming from an outstanding run from Getasew Ferguson in the U/16 boys 1500m (4.12.32) smashing a record set in 1976 by  more than 5 seconds.  Brooke Jones was one of St Brendan Shaw College’s dominant athletes setting new marks in the girls U/16 200m (25.93) and 400m (60.22) events.  Two boys U/13 events records tumbled with Jordan Iramu jumping 1.74 in the High Jump and Ben Saint-John running 4.45.35 in the 1500m.  Sophie Gibson from Scotch Oakburn left the field behind with a record run in the Open girls hurdles (17.63).

A highlight of the day was the effort put in by over 50 volunteers who manned events and the technical side of the carnival.  Many gave up a day’s work to help out .  Without their support, the local Athletics clubs and the work from Athletics Tasmania the carnival would not go ahead.

All Athletes and officials are now focusing their efforts on the SATIS Carnival which will be held at St Leonards Athletics Centre on Saturday 17th October.  First event starts at 9.00 am.  If you are unable to get to the track the 100m events will be broadcast on City Park Radio between 12.00 and 1.00.