Keshorn "Keshie" Walcott, ORTT (born 2 April 1993) is a Trinbagonian

track and field Track and field (or athletics in British English) is a sport that includes Competition#Sports, athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name used in North America is derived from where the sport takes place, a ru ...

athlete who competes in the

javelin throw The javelin throw is a track and field event where the javelin, a spear about in length, is thrown as far as possible. The javelin thrower gains momentum by running within a predetermined area. Javelin throwing is an event of both the men's de ...

. He is an Olympic champion, having won gold in 2012. He is the first Caribbean male athlete, as well as the first of African descent, to win the gold medal in a throwing event in the history of the Olympics. He is also the holder of the North, Central American and Caribbean junior record. Walcott is the youngest Olympic gold medallist in the men's javelin (19 years 131 days), and the first athlete in any

event to win World Junior and Olympic titles in an individual event the same year.

Career

Early life and medals

Born the third child of Beverly Walcott and Endy King, Walcott grew up playing

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

and

cricket Cricket is a Bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball game played between two Sports team, teams of eleven players on a cricket field, field, at the centre of which is a cricket pitch, pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two Bail (cr ...

, striving to keep up with his athletically talented older brother Elton. He was raised in the fishing village of

Toco Toco is the most northeasterly village on the island of Trinidad in Trinidad and Tobago. The island of Tobago is to the northeast, making Toco the closest point in Trinidad to the sister island. The name Toco was ascribed to the area by its early ...

, in north-east Trinidad. He did not take up the javelin until the age of 15, but found immediate success. By April 2009, one week after his 16th birthday, he was the Caribbean youth (under-17) champion. In 2010 he stepped up to the standard regulation javelin (800-gram), and he continued his domination of the Caribbean junior division, as the three-time winner in the Junior (under-20) javelin throw at the

CARIFTA Games The CARIFTA Games is an annual athletics competition founded by the Caribbean Free Trade Association (CARIFTA). The games were first held in 1972 and consist of track and field events including sprint races, hurdles, middle distance track ev ...

in 2010 to 2012, setting a new NACAC North, Central American and Caribbean junior record in 2012.

2012 World Junior Champion

He began the Olympic year in April with his fourth-consecutive victory at CARIFTA Juniors. A record throw of earned him the distinction of competing unbeaten throughout his CARIFTA career. In late May 2012 he twice improved his personal best, breaking through the 80-meter mark (262 feet) for the first time. At the Quantum Classic in Trinidad and Tobago he threw , breaking Trinidad's national javelin record of , set in 1996 by Kurt Thompson. It was also a NACAC junior record as well. One week later he reset all those marks, while competing at the IAAF International Centennial Meet in

Havana Havana (; ) is the capital and largest city of Cuba. The heart of La Habana Province, Havana is the country's main port and commercial center.Olympic javelin gold medal with a throw of . He defeated a string of top athletes to win the competition including 90-metre thrower Tero Pitkämäki and two-time defending Olympic champion Andreas Thorkildsen, as well as Veselý,

Oleksandr Pyatnytsya Oleksandr Serhiiovich Pyatnytsya (; born 14 July 1985 in Dnipropetrovsk) is a male javelin thrower from Ukraine. His personal best is 86.12 metres, achieved in May 2012 in Kyiv, which was a new national record. Career He won the bronze medal ...

and Antti Ruuskanen. This made Walcott the youngest-ever Olympic champion in javelin throw and the second non-European to win the Olympic gold in men's javelin throw since American thrower

Cy Young Denton True "Cy" Young (March 29, 1867 – November 4, 1955) was an American Major League Baseball (MLB) pitcher. Born in Gilmore, Ohio, he worked on his family's farm as a youth before starting his professional baseball career. Young entered t ...

in Helsinki in 1952. Steve Backley, a former three-time Olympic medalist in the javelin remarked that it was a "surprise win for Keshorn Walcott. Everyone else struggled with the wind". Following his Olympic victory, Walcott was hailed as a national hero. On 13 August, the day of his arrival back in Trinidad, was declared a national holiday. He was awarded $150,000 in cash and given land near his hometown of Toco, as well as a luxury home in Port of Spain. In addition, both the Toco lighthouse, (in north-east Trinidad) and the Toco Secondary School were renamed in his honour. Walcott has been coached since 2009 by Cuban-born Ismael Lopez Mastrapa.

2013 to 2014

Walcott's 2013 season was hampered by injury. In his first competition since his Olympic victory, he "opened big", nearly matching his personal best with an opening round throw of at a hometown meet in Hasely Crawford Stadium in

Port of Spain Port of Spain ( ; Trinidadian and Tobagonian English, Trinidadian English: ''Port ah Spain'' ) is the capital and chief port of Trinidad and Tobago. With a municipal population of 49,867 (2017), an urban population of 81,142 and a transient dail ...

, Trinidad, on Friday 3 May. In an early March 2014 interview with BBC Scotland, Walcott said that after some rest his ankle "is back to normal". With no World or Olympic competitions to aim for, his 2014 season will be targeted on the

2014 Commonwealth Games The 2014 Commonwealth Games (), officially known as the XX Commonwealth Games and commonly known as Glasgow 2014 (; ), were an international multi-sport event celebrated in the tradition of the Commonwealth Games as governed by the Commonwea ...

, to be held in

Glasgow Glasgow is the Cities of Scotland, most populous city in Scotland, located on the banks of the River Clyde in Strathclyde, west central Scotland. It is the List of cities in the United Kingdom, third-most-populous city in the United Kingdom ...

, Scotland. He had a six-week training camp in Cuba in March and planned to compete at a few events in May 2014, before taking part in another training camp in Europe so he can adjust to Glasgow's climate. He said, "My coach likes me to get away from a lot of distractions and just focus on training and being healthy." In the qualifying round of the

, Kershorn threw a new personal best of on 1 August, but in the finals on 2 August he finished second with a throw of 82.67m, trailing Julius Yego of Kenya's winning 83.87m. At the IAAF Diamond League's final meeting, the Weltklasse in Zurich, Switzerland on 28 August 2014, he set a new personal best/national record of in the opening round, finishing second behind Germany's Thomas Rohler's toss of 87.63m.

Tokyo Olympics 2020

The 2012 London Olympic champion Keshorn Walcott did not qualify for the men's javelin throw final after finishing 7th in Group B in the qualification phase. Throwing in Group B, Walcott's best throw of 79.33 on his third throw placed him 7th in that group which was not good enough to qualify him for his third straight Olympic javelin final.

Competition record

Seasonal bests

*2010 – *2011 – *2012 – *2013 – *2014 – *2015 – NR *2016 – *2017 –

References

External links