Na­tion­al Olympic track star Je­hue Gor­don yes­ter­day told a group of stu­dents that they must have fun and love for sport if they are to en­joy a bal­anced life.

Gor­don was speak­ing at the launch of the 26th edi­tion of the Mi­lo Track and Field Games which was held yes­ter­day at the Har­vard Sports Club, St James.

The Games will be held on March 5, at the Hase­ly Craw­ford Sta­di­um with young ath­letes from over 20 pri­ma­ry schools com­pet­ing in the Port of Spain and En­vi­rons Zone. The ath­letes would com­pete in the Un­der 9, Un­der 11, Un­der 13 and 13-15 age groups. The pre­lim­i­nary track heats will be held to­day at 9:15am and 12:00pm for the West A zone and West B zone re­spec­tive­ly at the Diego Mar­tin Cen­tral Sec­ondary School.

Gor­don, who start­ed his run­ning days as a pri­ma­ry school stu­dent at Mar­aval R.C School said Games played an in­stru­men­tal part in his suc­cess. He joked that "drink­ing Mi­lo prob­a­bly helped me with my sud­den growth sprout."

He said he was one of the small­est ath­letes but that did not stop him, since he had the love and pas­sion for sport.

He al­so told the stu­dents that they should learn to bal­ance sport and school­work.

Kelvin Nan­coo, chair­man of the Games said it had pro­duced 13 na­tion­al ath­letes, in­clud­ing Michelle Lee Ahye, Fana Ash­by and Cleav­on Dil­lion.

Al­so speak­ing was Sta­cy-Ann Charles, con­sumer mar­ket­ing man­ag­er–bev­er­ages at Nes­tle, who said her com­pa­ny was de­light­ed to con­tin­ue its as­so­ci­a­tion with the Games since it was do­ing so much for the de­vel­op­ment of youth in the coun­try.

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