Some established faces and the absence of others present two weeks ago characterised the athletic meet organised by Athletics Malta, at Marsa, last weekend.

Making their presence felt were Andy Grech, Rachid Chouhal and Mario Mifsud, seasoned campaigners who provided flair and excitement with their performances.

In the short 60m sprint, Grech managed to hold sway in the preliminary as well as in the second race of the day, edging out Chouhal by two-hundredths of a second in a time of 7.06 seconds.

Junior athlete Luke Bezzina also gave notice of his renewed presence with the fourth best time of the day, clocking 7.21 to Steve Camilleri’s 7.19 seconds.

On the field, Mifsud opened his season’s score with a heave of 38.74m in the discus while in the long jump Grech cleared 6.88 metres.

For the longer sprints, both Matthew Croker and Neil Brimmer proved once more that they are the dominant force to deal with, the former stopping the clock on 36.59 seconds in the 300m and Brimmer recording 17.51 in the 150m and 1:26.08 minutes in the 600m.

Among the women it was clearly Nicole Gatt’s afternoon.

The plucky youngster proved to be the fastest in the 60m with her best time of 7.95 seconds, before she went on to win the 300m and 150m sprints in 42.02 and 20 seconds flat respectively.

Among other girls whose performances deserve mention were Rachel Fitz, Sian Pledger, Rebecca Sare and Ylenia Lapira.

The concluding event was all poise and grace as Luke Micallef showed a steady pace in the 3,000m steeplechase, which he finished in a time of just over 11 minutes to the delight of his coaches Mario Pisani and Dario Mangion.