James Beckford (born 9 January 1975 in Saint Mary, Jamaica) is a

Jamaica Jamaica (; ) is an island country situated in the Caribbean Sea. Spanning in area, it is the third-largest island of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean (after Cuba and Hispaniola). Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, and west of His ...

track and field Track and field is a sport that includes athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name is derived from where the sport takes place, a running track and a grass field for the throwing and some of the jumping events ...

athlete competing in the

long jump The long jump is a track and field event in which athletes combine speed, strength and agility in an attempt to leap as far as possible from a takeoff point. Along with the triple jump, the two events that measure jumping for distance as a gr ...

. He represented Jamaica at the Olympic level in

1996 File:1996 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: A Centennial Olympic Park bombing, bomb explodes at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, set off by a radical Anti-abortion violence, anti-abortionist; The center fuel tank explodes on TWA Flight 8 ...

2000 File:2000 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Protests against Bush v. Gore after the 2000 United States presidential election; Heads of state meet for the Millennium Summit; The International Space Station in its infant form as seen from ...

and

2004 2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and its Abolition (by UNESCO). Events January * January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight 6 ...

. He was 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, etc ...

list in the long jump at the 1996 Olympics and also has two silvers from the

World Championships in Athletics The World Athletics Championships (until 2019 known as the World Championships in Athletics) are a biennial athletics competition organized by World Athletics (formerly IAAF, International Association of Athletics Federations). Alongside the Ol ...

(from 1995 and 2003). He was chosen as the

Jamaica Sportsman of the Year The Jamaican Sportsman and Sportswoman of the Year is an annual election, organised by the RJR Sports Foundation, which honours outstanding achievement(s) in sport by Jamaican athletes during the previous year. List of winners See also *Athlete ...

for 1995, 1996 and 2003. He is the current holder of the Jamaican record for the

triple jump The triple jump, sometimes referred to as the hop, step and jump or the hop, skip and jump, is a track and field event, similar to the long jump. As a group, the two events are referred to as the "horizontal jumps". The competitor runs down th ...

with a mark of 17.92 m, and was also the holder of the long jump record at 8.62m until 28 September. 2019 when it was replaced with a mark of 8.69 m by Tajay Gayle at the

in Doha, Qatar. Beckford was educated in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

and began his athletics career there, specialising in the horizontal jumps. He took the triple jump title at

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

's Class AAAA championship, representing

William R. Boone High School William Rennick Boone High School is a public high school in Orlando, Florida. Built in 1952, the school is one of twenty high schools in the Orange County Public Schools system, created to accommodate the growing number of students at Orlando H ...

. He moved to

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...

to study at Blinn College. While there he improved

Delroy Poyser Delroy Poyser (5 January 1962 – 11 February 2019) was a Jamaican long jumper, who won the gold medal for his native country at the 1982 Central American and Caribbean Games in Havana, Cuba Havana (; Spanish: ''La Habana'' ) is the capit ...

's Jamaican record with a jump of 17.29 metres (56 ft 8¾ in) – a mark which was also the world-leading outdoor jump at that point in April 1994. His personal best of is currently ranked 15th on the all-time list. Since he made that jump, 5 April 1997 in

Orlando, Florida Orlando () is a city in the U.S. state of Florida and is the county seat of Orange County, Florida, Orange County. In Central Florida, it is the center of the Greater Orlando, Orlando metropolitan area, which had a population of 2,509,831, acco ...

, only 6 men have jumped farther. He was banned from competition for three months in 1997 after he failed a drug test for ephedrine, a banned stimulant. He has competed at the World Championships on five occasions and the IAAF World Indoor Championships on six occasions. Aside from his global performances, he has won medals at the Summer Universiade, the

Goodwill Games The Goodwill Games were an international sports competition created by Ted Turner in reaction to the political troubles surrounding the Olympic Games of the 1980s. In 1979, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan caused the United States and other ...

, the IAAF Grand Prix Final, as well as a silver medal from the 1998 CAC Games. He remains active, winning the 2018 World Masters Championships.

Achievements

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Beckford, James 1975 births Living people People from Saint Mary Parish, Jamaica Jamaican male long jumpers Jamaican male triple jumpers Olympic athletes of Jamaica Athletes (track and field) at the 1996 Summer Olympics Athletes (track and field) at the 2000 Summer Olympics Athletes (track and field) at the 2004 Summer Olympics Olympic silver medalists for Jamaica Doping cases in athletics Blinn College alumni Jamaican sportspeople in doping cases World Athletics Championships medalists Junior college men's track and field athletes in the United States Medalists at the 1996 Summer Olympics Olympic silver medalists in athletics (track and field) Universiade medalists in athletics (track and field) Goodwill Games medalists in athletics Central American and Caribbean Games silver medalists for Jamaica Competitors at the 1998 Central American and Caribbean Games Universiade silver medalists for Jamaica Central American and Caribbean Games medalists in athletics Medalists at the 1997 Summer Universiade Competitors at the 1998 Goodwill Games Competitors at the 2001 Goodwill Games Goodwill Games gold medalists in athletics