Veronica Campbell Brown (born 15 May 1982) is a retired Jamaican

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 ...

sprinter, who specialized in the 100 and 200 meters. An eight-time

Olympic medal An Olympic medal is awarded to successful competitors at one of the Olympic Games. There are three classes of medal to be won: gold medal, gold, silver medal, silver, and bronze medal, bronze, awarded to first, second, and third place, respect ...

ist, she is the second of three women in history to win two consecutive Olympic 200 m gold medals, after

Bärbel Wöckel Bärbel Wöckel ( Eckert; born 21 March 1955) is a former East German sprinter. She never ran a world record in the individual disciplines. However, she ran several world records as part of relay teams with Doris Maletzki, Renate Ste ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

and compatriot

Elaine Thompson-Herah Elaine Sandra-Lee Thompson-Herah (born 28 June 1992) is a Jamaican sprinter who competes in the 60 metres, 100 metres and 200 metres. Regarded as one of the greatest sprinters of all time, she is a five-time Olympic champion, the fastest wom ...

. Campbell-Brown is one of only eleven athletes to win World Championship titles at the youth, junior, and senior levels of an athletic event. She holds personal bests of 10.76 seconds for the 100 m and 21.74 seconds for the 200 m. She was the 100 m gold medallist at the

2007 World Championships in Athletics The 11th World Championships in Athletics, () under the auspices of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), were held at Nagai Stadium in Osaka, Japan from 24 August to 2 September 2007. 200 of the IAAF's 212 member feder ...

and the 200 m gold medallist at the

2011 World Championships in Athletics The 13th IAAF World Championships in Athletics () was an international athletics competition that was held in Daegu, South Korea. It started on 27 August 2011 and finished on 4 September 2011. The United States topped the medal standings in the ...

. She has also won seven silver medals and one bronze medal in her career at the World Championships in Athletics. Over

60 metres 60 metres, or 60-meter dash, is a sprint event in track and field. It is a championship event for indoor championships, normally dominated by the best outdoor 100 metres runners. At indoor events, the 60 metres is run on lanes set out in the mi ...

, she is a two-time champion at the IAAF World Indoor Championships.

Early life

Campbell was born to Cecil Campbell and Pamela Bailey in Clarks Town, Trelawny,

Jamaica Jamaica is an island country in the Caribbean Sea and the West Indies. At , it is the third-largest island—after Cuba and Hispaniola—of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean. Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, west of Hispaniola (the is ...

on 15 May 1982. She has five brothers and four sisters and attended Troy Primary and Vere Technical High School in Clarendon before pursuing higher education in the United States at the

University of Arkansas The University of Arkansas (U of A, UArk, or UA) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Fayetteville, Arkansas, United States. It is the Flagship campus, flagship campus of the University of Arkan ...

Junior career

In 1999, she won two

gold medal A gold medal is a medal awarded for highest achievement in a non-military field. Its name derives from the use of at least a fraction of gold in form of plating or alloying in its manufacture. Since the eighteenth century, gold medals have b ...

s, the 100 m and 4 × 100 m relay at the inaugural IAAF World Youth Championships. The following year, she became the first female to win the sprint double at the IAAF World Junior Championships. She took the 100 m in 11.12 s (which was a championship record at the time) and the 200 m in 22.87 s. At the

2000 Olympic Games The 2000 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXVII Olympiad, officially branded as Sydney 2000, and also known as the Games of the New Millennium, were an international multi-sport event held from 15 September to 1 October ...

, she ran the second leg on the

silver medal A silver medal, in sports and other similar areas involving competition, is a medal made of, or plated with, silver awarded to the second-place finisher, or runner-up, of contests or competitions such as the Olympic Games, Commonwealth Games, ...

winning 4 × 100 m relay team. In 2001, she was awarded the Austin Sealy Trophy for the most outstanding athlete of the

2001 CARIFTA Games The 30th CARIFTA Games was held in Bridgetown, Barbados, on April 14–16, 2001. An appraisal of the results has been given on the occasion of 40th anniversary of the games, and on the IAAF website. Participation (unofficial) Detailed res ...

. That year, she won 3 gold medals (100 m, 200 m, and 4 × 100 m relay) in the junior (U-20) category.

College career

Campbell attended Barton County Community College in Great Bend,

Kansas Kansas ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Nebraska to the north; Missouri to the east; Oklahoma to the south; and Colorado to the west. Kansas is named a ...

, where she set several records and won many titles, including four national junior college titles in the 60, 100 and 200 metres both indoors and outdoors. She holds the current record for Barton County CC in the outdoor 100 m and 200 m. Campbell also excelled academically, earning an associate degree from Barton County in 2002 with a 3.8 grade average. She later attended the

, where she stood out as a sprint star in a programme dominated by long-distance runners.

Professional career

At 18 years old, Campbell-Brown won the first Olympic medal of her illustrious career. She competed at the

2000 Summer Olympics The 2000 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXVII Olympiad, officially branded as Sydney 2000, and also known as the Games of the New Millennium, were an international multi-sport event held from 15 September to 1 October ...

in the 4 × 100 m relay along with Tayna Lawrence, Beverly McDonald, Merlene Frazer and sprint veteran and Olympic legend,

Merlene Ottey Merlene Joyce Ottey (born 10 May 1960) is a Jamaican-Slovenian former track and field sprint (running), sprinter. She began her career representing Jamaica in 1978 and continued to do so for 24 years before representing Slovenia from 2002 to 20 ...

where the team finished second in the finals in a time of 42.13 seconds behind Caribbean neighbors,

Bahamas The Bahamas, officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an archipelagic and island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the Atlantic Ocean. It contains 97 per cent of the archipelago's land area and 88 per cent of its population. ...

. Campbell Brown had shown herself to be a promising athlete as a junior, having won at the junior level and at Jamaica's yearly Boys and Girls Championship for her high school, Vere Technical High. The Championship has been credited as the engineer behind Jamaica's success on the Track and Field World stage. At the age of 22, Campbell-Brown represented Jamaica at the 2004 Athens Olympics. She competed in both the 100 m and 200 m. In the finals of the 100 m, she placed third. Campbell Brown later competed in the 200 m finals, a race American Allyson Felix was favored to win. VCB went on to decimate the field in the 200 m finals. She ran a blistering curve and held her form down the final stretch to become the first Jamaican and Caribbean woman in the history of the Olympic games to win a sprint Olympic title. A visibly emotional Campbell Brown was brought to tears at the medal ceremony as her national anthem was played in the stadium and flag hoisted. Campbell-Brown then teamed up with Aleen Bailey, Tayna Lawrence, and Sherone Simpson in the finals of the 4 × 100 m. VCB ran a scintillating anchor leg as Jamaica went on to win the women's 4 × 100 m. Jamaica created history as it was the first time Jamaica had won the 4 × 100 m relay at the Olympics. In August 2005, Campbell won the silver medal in the 100 m at the

2005 World Championships in Athletics The 10th World Championships in Athletics (, ), under the auspices of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), were held in the Olympic Stadium, Helsinki, Finland (6 August 2005 – 14 August 2005), the site of the first ...

. She won another silver medal in the 4 × 100 m relay (together with Daniele Browning, Aleen Bailey and Sherone Simpson). At the 2007 World Championships, Campbell won three medals, a gold in the 100 m, silver in the 200 m (second to Felix) and silver in the 4 × 100 m relay. At the 2008 Jamaican Olympic trials, she finished fourth in the 100 m, thereby missing the qualifying requirement to automatically make the

n Olympic roster for that event. She clocked 10.88 s in the final, which is the second-fastest time ever for a fourth-place finish. She, however, bounced back to take the 200 m final in what was then a personal best time of 21.94 s. Having failed to qualify for the 100 m, she only competed in the 200 m and the 4 × 100 m relay at the Olympic Games. At the opening ceremony of the

2008 Olympics The 2008 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXIX Olympiad () and officially branded as Beijing 2008 (), were an international multisport event held from 8 to 24 August 2008, in Beijing, China. A total of 10,942 athletes fr ...

, Veronica Campbell-Brown carried the Jamaican flag during the Athletes' Parade. She successfully defended her Olympic 200 m title in a new personal best time of 21.74 s. She competed at the 4 x 100 m relay together with Shelly-Ann Fraser, Sheri-Ann Brooks and Aleen Bailey. In the first round heats, Jamaica placed first in front of

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

and

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

. The Jamaican teams' time of 42.24 s was the first time overall out of sixteen participating nations. With this result, Jamaica qualified for the final, replacing Brooks and Bailey with Sherone Simpson and Kerron Stewart. Jamaica did not finish the race due to a mistake in the baton exchange. At the end of the 2008 season, Campbell-Brown was selected the top 200 m runner in the world and the fourth best in the 100 m (following three other Jamaicans) by ''Track and Field News''. She also finished eighth overall in voting for the magazine's Woman of the Year. She qualified for her third World Championships by winning the 200 m national title. She beat runners-up Shelly Ann Fraser and Simone Facey with a time of 22.40 seconds in June 2009, although a toe injury had left her lacking full fitness. At the 2009 World Championships Campbell-Brown was fourth in the 100 m final behind teammates Fraser and Stewart. She then won her second World 200 m silver behind American Allyson Felix. She closed the season at the Shanghai Golden Grand Prix, recording her fastest of the year (10.89) to take second behind Carmelita Jeter, who became the second fastest ever with 10.64 seconds. Although Jeter beat her, Campbell-Brown was the fourth fastest 100 m sprinter overall that season. In 2010, she won her first World Indoor 60 m Gold medal in a time of 7.00. She later ran the fastest time for the 200 m in 21.98 in New York. She also ran a 10.78 in Eugene, Oregon, beating Fraser-Pryce and Jeter. In 2011 Veronica Campbell-Brown won the Jamaican athletic trials in both the 100 & 200 m and was one of the favorites for both gold medals at the World Championships in Daegu. At the championships, she won the silver medal in the women's 100 m in 10.98 behind Jeter, who won in 10.90. She later won her first 200 m world title in a timer of 22.22, beating Jeter and Felix, who were second and third, respectively. In 2015, Campbell made it to the Semi and Finals of the World Championships 100 and 200 m, Finishing 3rd in the 200 m, which Dafne Schippers won. In 2012, she defended her 60 m World Indoor Gold medal, which she won in a time of 7.01. Later in June, Veronica qualified for the 2012 Olympic Games in London, both at 100 m and 200 m. In the 100 m she came third behind Shelly Ann Fraser Pryce and Carmelita Jeter. In the 200 m she finished just outside the medals in 4th place, 0.24 of a second outside of bronze. In the 4 × 100 m relay final, she and the Jamaican team came second behind the U.S., which won in a new world record of 40.82 s. In 2014, Campbell-Brown competed at the 2014 World Indoor Championships in

Sopot Sopot (; or ) is a seaside resort city in Pomerelia on the southern coast of the Baltic Sea in northern Poland, with a population of approximately 40,000. It is located in Pomeranian Voivodeship, Pomerania Province and has the City with powiat ri ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

, and over the 60 m race, ending up in 5th place with a time of 7.13 s. In 2015, she competed at the

2015 World Championships in Athletics The 2015 IAAF World Championships ( zh, 第十五届世界田径锦标赛), the fifteenth edition of the IAAF World Championships, were held from 22 to 30 August at the National Stadium in Beijing, China. Forty-three nations won medals, 144 of ...

Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...

, and participated in sprint events of 100 m, 200 m, and 4 × 100 m relay—where she finished in fourth place with a time of 10.91 s, won the bronze medal with a time of 21.97 s and secured the gold with a time of 41.07 s respectively. Campbell-Brown also qualified for the 2016 Rio Olympics in the 200 m and 4 × 100 m relay. In the 200 m, she did not make it out of the heats and finished in 27th place with a time of 22.97 s but won the silver as part of the Jamaican team in the 4 × 100 m relay with a time of 41.36 s behind the US team, which finished with a time of 41.01 s, the second fastest time ever run for the event.

Positive doping test

On 14 June 2013, it was reported that Campbell-Brown had tested positive for

diuretic A diuretic () is any substance that promotes diuresis, the increased production of urine. This includes forced diuresis. A diuretic tablet is sometimes colloquially called a water tablet. There are several categories of diuretics. All diuretics ...

s while competing at the JAAA Supreme Ventures, a Jamaican meet.Veronica Campbell Brown tests positive for banned substance: Jamaican news report
She was provisionally suspended from competition. Campbell-Brown denied that she had intentionally taken any banned substances. On 2 October 2013, she was cleared by the Jamaica Athletics Administrative Association (JAAA) to resume competition. The panel said this is not one of the most serious offences, and it was appropriate that she should be given a public warning with no ban from competition. They deemed she did not use the prohibited substance for performance enhancement. The substance in question— Lasix, not necessarily a performance-enhancing drug, but rather a potential masking agent for other banned substances—was contained in a cream the athlete had used for a leg injury. The

International Association of Athletics Federations World Athletics, formerly known as the International Amateur Athletic Federation and International Association of Athletics Federations and formerly abbreviated as the IAAF, is the international governing body for the sport of athletics, coverin ...

appealed this decision at the

Court of Arbitration for Sport The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS; , TAS) is an international body established in 1984 to settle disputes related to sport through arbitration. Its headquarters are in Lausanne, Switzerland, and its courts are located in New York City, Sy ...

. The court decided to clear Campbell-Brown of all doping charges as the JAAA doping procedures did not comply with required international standards.

Personal life

In 2007, Campbell married Omar Brown, a fellow Jamaican sprinter and University of Arkansas alumnus, changing her name to Campbell-Brown, a few years later she dropped the hyphen from her name, changing it to Campbell Brown. They currently live and train in

Clermont, Florida Clermont is the most populous city in Lake County, Florida, Lake County, within the U.S. state of Florida. The population was 43,021 in 2020. It is about west of Orlando, Florida, Orlando and southeast of Leesburg, Florida, Leesburg. The cit ...

. She was appointed as a

UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador is an official postnominal honorific title, title of authority, legal status and job description assigned to those goodwill ambassadors and advocates who are designated by the United Nations. UNESCO goodwill ambas ...

in late 2009 and stated that she would use the role to promote gender equity in sport.

Achievements

Campbell-Brown's personal best of 10.76 s in the 100 m ranks her all-time top fifteen in the world (tied for 11th place) and sixth among Jamaican women. Her 200 m best (21.74 s) ranks her in the all-time top fifteen in the world. This time is the fifth best among Jamaican women. It is the tied sixth fastest time of the 21st century and was the fastest since

Marion Jones Marion Lois Jones (born October 12, 1975), also known as Marion Jones-Thompson, is an American former world champion track-and-field athlete and former professional basketball player. She won three gold medals and two bronze medals at the 2000 ...

's 21.62 s in Johannesburg 1998.200 Metres All Time

IAAF World Athletics, formerly known as the International Amateur Athletic Federation and International Association of Athletics Federations and formerly abbreviated as the IAAF, is the international sports governing body, governing body for the sport ...

. Retrieved on 7 September 2015. She earned a total of 46 medals (27 gold, 16 silver, 3 bronze).

Personal bests

+ = en route to a longer distance *All information from IAAF Profile

Competition record

References

External links