The All-Carroll County Championships are the final tune-up for many area high school track and field teams before they wrap up the regular season with their respective region championships.

With that in mind, Temple coach Steve Robinson decided to make the sixth annual meet at Temple High School a two-day event.

“We wanted to give it a semi-regional kind of flavor,” Robinson said. “That’s exactly what we try to use it as, a good tune-up for the region, so you know what your team can do when it comes to region.”

All of the region meets will take place over the next two weeks leading up to the state meets, which for the girls will be held May 1-3 in Albany and for the boys will take place May 8-10 in Jefferson.

Temple, Villa Rica, Bowdon, Mt. Zion and Heard County are all competing at this year’s All-Carroll County Championships. Haralson County, which participated last season, is on spring break this week.

The four Carroll County teams have been longtime supporters of the All-Carroll County Championships and Robinson said Heard County has become a big supporter of it as well in recent years.

“I’m happy with the turnout and I think it’ll still continue to grow,” Robinson said. “I think we had a lot of good kids here that got an opportunity to run in front of a crowd. It was a good surface and it was really structured for them and I’m real proud that they got the opportunity to perform under those circumstances.”

Temple’s track surface is new this year and Robinson said he hopes to have a ribbon-cutting ceremony to commemorate the new track.

After day one of the event Wednesday, the Villa Rica boys were leading with 76 points. Temple was in second place with 53 points and Heard County was in third with 39 points. The Wildcats won the meet on the boys side last year with Haralson County coming in second and Temple finishing in third.

For the girls, Temple was in first place with 56 points. Heard County (42) and Villa Rica (41) followed in second and third, respectively.

The Lady Tigers took first place on the girls side last year. Villa Rica came in second and Heard County finished third.

Villa Rica’s Wes Wright and Patrice Gates have dominated the field events for their respective squads over the year.

Wright, a senior and Auburn signee, and Gates, just a sophomore, both won state at the Class AAA level last year for the Wildcats, with Gates winning the discus and taking second in the shot, while Wright won the shot put for the second consecutive year.

The All-Carroll County Championships continue today at 4 p.m. with the field events. The 400-meter finals kick off the track events an hour later and the whole event is expected to finish by 7 p.m.