Kemba revs up Mount Alvernia track team

Enthused by the performance by past student Kemba Nelson at the NCAA Indoor Championships, the Mount Alvernia High School track and field team is buzzing with energy.

That's what coach Andrew Henry has seen during training at the Montego Bay-based school since Nelson zoomed into prominence on March 13.

Henry says Nelson has made the present team members believe in their own potential.

Nelson, a student athlete at Mount Alvernia up to 2017, sped to victory in the 60 metres in an NCAA record time of 7.05 seconds, and the coach said on March 17 that her performance has revved up his team.

"It actually make them realise that, you know what, I can do this because if she can do it, I can do it, too," he said.

"A lot of persons know Mount Alvernia for maybe tennis, for netball, for academics, but not a lot of persons would look at Mount Alvernia as a school that would have an athlete such as a Kemba Nelson."

The result has been a change in the attitude to training. "So the girls realise that we at Mount Alvernia, many persons may not see us in a particular light, but that does not mean that we can't achieve; and I can tell you for a fact, the effort from the girls, well, has increased since Saturday. When I look at the training programme on Monday, and yesterday, you can see it's a different attitude," he said.

Henry, who coached Nelson for most of her time at Mount Alvernia, was mightily impressed with her run on Saturday. "The timing was surprising, but in terms of her effort, it's not surprising because, you know, she is a championship athlete.

Objectives

It doesn't matter where she's at, from the moment she in a final, her aim is always to win and it doesn't matter who's she's up against, she's focused on what her objectives are," said the coach, who helped her to two Western Championships Class Two sprint doubles and a silver medal in the 100 at Boys and Girls' Athletics Championships in 2017.

Former middle-distance runner Lawrence Mendez coached Nelson during her first year at Mount Alvernia and he pinpointed her greatest asset. "She runs with high knees, like Usain Bolt, she doesn't have to develop it. She's a natural sprinter, she's naturally fast. She has that forward bend, and if you look at her arm drive, she doesn't have 'girl' arm drive. She runs with perfect arm technique, so all she needed was in terms of weights and such,"Mendez outlined.

He thinks highly of Nelson's future prospects. "This is her first season and she's not used to the climate and everything, and she hasn't done one year and she's doing that well. If she doesn't get injured, she, I don't know, I don't want to say , 10.6, 10.6," he said.