Derek Loccident (born July 13, 1998) is an American T64 Paralympic athlete.

Early life

Loccident attended

Westmoore High School Westmoore High School is an American four-year public high school located in south Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. The school was founded in 1988 and serves the ninth through the twelfth grades as part of the Moore Public School District. Westmoore ...

where he played

American football American football, referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada and also known as gridiron football, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular American football field, field with goalposts at e ...

. During his senior year he recorded 53 tackles with one interception and earned All-Conference, All-District and Class 6A All-Star honors. He then played

college football College football is gridiron football that is played by teams of amateur Student athlete, student-athletes at universities and colleges. It was through collegiate competition that gridiron football American football in the United States, firs ...

Central Oklahoma Central Oklahoma is the geographical name for the central region of the U.S. state of Oklahoma. It is also known by the Oklahoma Department of Tourism and Recreation, Oklahoma Department of Tourism designation, Frontier Country, defined as the 12 ...

. On September 9, 2018, he was crawling under a stopped train when it started moving and severed his left foot. He underwent several surgeries when doctors became concerned about infection in his leg, resulting in its amputation. Prior to the accident, during his redshirt sophomore year, he led the team in tackles with 15 in the team's first two games of the season. He missed the remainder of the 2018 season, the

2019 season Nineteen or 19 may refer to: * 19 (number) * One of the years 19 BC, AD 19, 1919, 2019 Films * ''19'' (film), a 2001 Japanese film * ''Nineteen'' (1987 film), a 1987 science fiction film * '' 19-Nineteen'', a 2009 South Korean film * '' Dici ...

, and the 2020 season due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

. He returned to play during the

2021 season 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number, numeral, and glyph. It is the first and smallest positive integer of the infinite sequence of natural numbers. This fundamental property has led to its unique uses in other fields, ranging from science to sp ...

as a below-the-knee amputee.

Para-athletics career

After his collegiate football career ended in 2021, Loccident was recruited by U.S. Para track and field coach

Joaquim Cruz Joaquim Carvalho Cruz (born 12 March 1963) is a Brazilian former middle-distance runner, winner of the 800 meters at the 1984 Summer Olympics. He is one of only ten men, and in August 1984 became the second man, to run the 800 metres in less th ...

, to try track and field as a Para athlete. By the end of 2022, he graduated and moved to California so he could train full time at the Chula Vista Elite Athlete Training Center as part of the sport's development program. On May 25, 2023, he was selected to represent the United States at the

2023 World Para Athletics Championships The 2023 World Para Athletics Championships was a Paralympic track and field meet organized by the World Para Athletics subcommittee of the International Paralympic Committee. It was the 10th edition of the event and was held in the Charlety St ...

, where he made his international debut. He won a silver medal in the long jump T64 event with a distance of 7.39 meters. On March 18, 2024, he was selected to represent the United States at the

2024 World Para Athletics Championships The 2024 World Para Athletics Championships was a para-athletics meet organized by the World Para Athletics, the respective sport branch of the International Paralympic Committee. This was the 11th edition of the event and was held at Kobe Univ ...

. He will participate in the 100 meter dash, high jump, long jump and javelin. He won a silver medal in the high jump T64 event with a personal-best 2.04 meters in his first-ever international high jump competition. His jump was the first time a T64 athlete had ever surpassed two meters at a

World Para Athletics Championships The World Para Athletics Championships, known as the IPC Athletics World Championships prior to 2017, are a biennial Paralympic athletics event organized by World Para Athletics, a subcommittee of the International Paralympic Committee (IPC). It ...

Personal life

OKCThunder Films released a short film titled ''Steps'' that premiered at the DeadCENTER Film Festival on June 10, 2023, that documents Loccident's story.

References

External links

*
Derek Loccident
at the

Paris 2024 Summer Paralympics The 2024 Summer Paralympics (), also known as the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games (), and branded as Paris 2024, were the 17th Summer Paralympic Games, an international Multi-sport event, multi-sport parasports event governed by the International P ...

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Loccident, Derek 1998 births Living people American amputees American male sprinters American male high jumpers American male long jumpers Central Oklahoma Bronchos football players Medalists at the World Para Athletics Championships Paralympic track and field athletes for the United States Athletes (track and field) at the 2024 Summer Paralympics Medalists at the 2024 Summer Paralympics Paralympic silver medalists for the United States Paralympic medalists in athletics (track and field) Track and field athletes from Oklahoma 21st-century American sportsmen Sportspeople from Oklahoma City