Randy Jenelle Givens (born March 27, 1962) is an American former

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 eve ...

athlete who competed in sprinting events. She set personal bests of 11.06 seconds for the 100-meter dash and 22.31 seconds for the

200-meter dash The 200 metres, or 200-meter dash, is a sprint running event. On an outdoor 400 metre racetrack, the race begins on the curve and ends on the home straight, so a combination of techniques is needed to successfully run the race. A slight ...

. Givens was a 200 m finalist at the

1984 Olympic Games The 1984 Olympics may refer to: *The 1984 Winter Olympics, which were held in Sarajevo, Yugoslavia *The 1984 Summer Olympics The 1984 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXIII Olympiad and also known as Los Angeles 1984) were an intern ...

and represented her country at the 1983 World Championships in Athletics. She was the 200 m gold medalist at the

1983 Pan American Games The 1983 Pan American Games were held in Caracas, Venezuela from August 14 to August 29, 1983. The games were the first major international competition to include relatively accurate steroid testing.Taylor, William N., ''Anabolic Steroids and the ...

and returned to win a silver medal at the 1987 edition. Givens established herself as a college athlete with the Florida State Seminoles and won four sprint titles (two individual, two relay) at the NCAA Women's Championships in 1984. She was also a multiple medalist at the

1983 Summer Universiade The 1983 Summer Universiade, also known as the 1983 World University Games or XII Summer Universiade, took place in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada between July 1 and 12, 1983. Over 2400 athletes from 73 countries participated. It was the first time Can ...

, taking 200 m and relay gold medals and a 100 m silver medal.

Early life and college

Born in

Alexandria, Louisiana Alexandria is the ninth-largest city in the state of Louisiana and is the parish seat of Rapides Parish, Louisiana, United States. It lies on the south bank of the Red River in almost the exact geographic center of the state. It is the prin ...

, she grew up in

Amityville, New York Amityville () is a village near the Town of Babylon in Suffolk County, on the South Shore of Long Island, in New York. The population was 9,523 at the 2010 census. History Huntington settlers first visited the Amityville area in 1653 du ...

and attended Amityville Memorial High School. She went on to attend Florida State University from 1980 to 1984 and competed for their Florida State Seminoles collegiate team. The team was very successful during the period which also included Olympic medalist sprinters

Marita Payne Marita Payne-Wiggins (born October 7, 1960) is a Canadian former track and field athlete who competed in two consecutive Summer Olympics. She is the co- Canadian record holder in the 400 metres, along with Jillian Richardson, and previously h ...

and Michelle Finn. Givens' first competitions were in the Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW) conference, which was a women's counterpart to the then-male dominated

National Collegiate Athletic Association The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges ...

(NCAA). At the AIAW indoor championships in 1981 she made the 300-meter dash final then won her first title, anchoring the Seminoles to victory in the 4×200-meter relay. She repeated that feat in the 4×100-meter relay at the AIAW outdoor meet, where she also placed third in the

. The following year she came third in the 300 m indoors and anchored the team to the runner-up spot in the 880-yard relay.Randy Givens
NoleFan. Retrieved on 2015-07-08.Randy Givens
Seminoles. Retrieved on 2015-07-08. NCAA track competition for women was instituted in 1982 and Givens competed at the

NCAA Women's Division I Outdoor Track and Field Championships The NCAA Division I Women's Outdoor Track and Field Championships are the annual collegiate track and field competitions for women athletes representing Division I institutions organised by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). At ...

. There she placed third in the 200 m, seventh in the 100-meter dash, and was a member of both the second-placed 4×100-meter and 4×400-meter relay teams. This performance helped the

Florida State Seminoles track and field The track and field teams of Florida State University, (variously Florida State or FSU), are currently coached by Bob Braman and compete in the Atlantic Coast Conference. The men's team has won fourteen indoor conference championships, thirty-fi ...

team to third place in the college rankings at the championship. She also won the collegiate 100 m at the

Penn Relays The Penn Relays (also Penn Relays Carnival) is the oldest and largest track and field competition in the United States, hosted annually since April 21, 1895 by the University of Pennsylvania at Franklin Field in Philadelphia. In 2012, there were ...

that season. At the 1983 NCAA Championships she was again third in the 200 m, improved one place to sixth in the 100 m, and claimed both relay titles, resulting in a runner-up team finish for the Seminoles behind the

UCLA Bruins The UCLA Bruins are the athletic teams that represent the University of California, Los Angeles. The Bruin men's and women's teams participate in NCAA Division I as part of the Pac-12 Conference and the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF) ...

. The peak of her collegiate track career came at the

1984 NCAA Division I Outdoor Track and Field Championships The 1984 NCAA Division I Outdoor Track and Field Championships were contested May 28−June 2, 1984 at Hayward Field at the University of Oregon in Eugene, Oregon in order to determine the individual and team national champions of men's and women' ...

. She achieved a sprint quadruple by winning the 100 m, 200 m, 4 × 100 m relay and

mile relay The mile, sometimes the international mile or statute mile to distinguish it from other miles, is a British imperial unit and United States customary unit of distance; both are based on the older English unit of length equal to 5,280 English ...

titles. The Florida State women comfortably won their first NCAA title, over twenty points ahead of the

Tennessee Volunteers The Tennessee Volunteers and Lady Volunteers are the 20 male and female varsity intercollegiate athletics programs that represent the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, Tennessee. The Volunteers compete in Division I of the National Collegi ...

. Givens was that year's Broderick Award (now the Honda Sports Award) winner in the track and field section. During her time at Florida State she set school records in the 100 m (11.06 seconds) and 200 m (22.31), as well as the indoor 300-yard dash and 300-meter dash. As of 2015, all the latter three times remain the school records for Florida State. She also set five records at the Penn relays, in the 100 m and both relays. She was inducted into the Florida State Athletic Hall of Fame in 1989. During her post-collegiate career she was a member of the Puma Track Club.

National and international career

Givens was a frequent finalist at the

USA Outdoor Track and Field Championships The USA Track & Field Outdoor Championships is an annual track and field competition organized by USA Track & Field, which serves as the American national championships for the sport. Since the year 1992, in the years which feature a Summer Oly ...

, coming fifth in the 200 m in 1980 and 1981, then reaching her first national podium in 1982 with a third-place finish. At the 1983 USA Championships she ran a lifetime best of 22.31 seconds to place fourth in the 200 m and was also fifth over 100 m. At the 1984 United States Olympic Trials she came third in the 200 m, earning Olympic selection, and was again ranked fifth over 100 m. After missing the 1985 season, she had her highest national placing at the 1986 USA Outdoor Track and Field Championships, taking second place to Pam Marshall. In the last national final of her career, she came eighth over 200 m in 1987.Randy Givens
Track and Field Brinkster. Retrieved on 2015-07-08. Givens' international career overlapped with her time at college. She competed at the highest level of student sport at the

and came away with a gold medal in the 200 m (ahead of schoolmate Marita Payne), becoming the first American to win that title. She was also silver medalist behind Beverly Kinch in the 100 m, and claimed a second gold medal in the 4×100 m relay. After a strong performance at the national championships she was chosen for the inaugural 1983 World Championships in Athletics. Her time of 23.01 seconds to win her heat was briefly the championship record. Givens reached the semi-finals of the 200 metres at the World Championships in Athletics and ranked 13th overall. She was also part of the relay team at the meet, but the American women did not perform to their usual high standard and were eliminated in the first round, one hundredth of a second behind Canada. The

followed shortly after that same month and Givens won the 200 m title, succeeding

Evelyn Ashford Evelyn Ashford (born April 15, 1957) is an American retired track and field athlete, the 1984 Olympic champion in the 100-meter dash. She ran under the 11-second barrier over 30 times and was the first to run under 11 seconds in an Olympic Gam ...

, and also shared in the 4×100 m relay gold medals with

Jackie Washington Jackie Washington (November 12, 1919 – June 27, 2009) was a Canadian blues musician. Biography He was born and raised in Hamilton, Ontario, the grandson of an African American fleeing slavery, and one of fifteen children born to his parents, ...

, Alice Jackson and college teammate Brenda Cliette. A third-place finish at the Olympic Trials earned her the right to compete at the

1984 Los Angeles Olympics The 1984 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXIII Olympiad and also known as Los Angeles 1984) were an international multi-sport event held from July 28 to August 12, 1984, in Los Angeles, California, United States. It marked the secon ...

. There she steadily improved through the Olympic 200 m rounds and placed sixth in the final with a time of 22.36 seconds – the second-fastest of her career. After graduating from Florida State, Givens appeared in two further major international competitions. At the

1986 Goodwill Games The 1986 Goodwill Games was the inaugural edition of the international multi-sport event created by Ted Turner, which was held from 5 – 20 July 1986. The main stadium was the Central Lenin Stadium in Moscow, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union. The Ga ...

she came fifth over 200 m and was a 4×100 m relay gold medalist alongside Michelle Finn, Diane Williams and Evelyn Ashford. She returned to defend her 200 m title at the 1987 Pan American Games held in Indianapolis, but was beaten into second place by her compatriot

Gwen Torrence Gwendolyn Lenna Torrence (born June 12, 1965) is a retired American sprinter and Olympic gold medalist. She was born in Decatur, Georgia. She attended Columbia High School and the University of Georgia. She was offered a scholarship because of ...

.Holbreich, Curt (1987-08-16)
THE 1987 PAN AMERICAN GAMES : Track and Field : Foster Has Another Unexpected Hurdle Cost Him a Victory
''Los Angeles Times''. Retrieved on 2015-07-08.

Personal records

* 100-meter dash – 11.06 seconds (1984) *

– 22.31 seconds (1983)

National titles

**100-meter dash: 1984 **200-meter dash: 1984 **4×100-meter dash: 1983, 1984 **4×400-meter/mile relay: 1983, 1984

International competitions

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Givens, Randy 1962 births Living people Sportspeople from Alexandria, Louisiana People from Amityville, New York Sportspeople from Suffolk County, New York Track and field athletes from Louisiana Track and field athletes from New York (state) American female sprinters African-American track and field athletes American female track and field athletes Olympic track and field athletes for the United States Athletes (track and field) at the 1984 Summer Olympics World Athletics Championships athletes for the United States Florida State Seminoles women's track and field athletes Universiade medalists in athletics (track and field) FISU World University Games gold medalists for the United States Universiade silver medalists for the United States Medalists at the 1983 Summer Universiade Competitors at the 1986 Goodwill Games Goodwill Games medalists in athletics Athletes (track and field) at the 1983 Pan American Games Athletes (track and field) at the 1987 Pan American Games Medalists at the 1983 Pan American Games Medalists at the 1987 Pan American Games Pan American Games gold medalists for the United States in athletics (track and field) Pan American Games silver medalists for the United States in athletics (track and field) Olympic female sprinters 21st-century African-American people 21st-century African-American women 20th-century African-American sportspeople 20th-century African-American women 20th-century African-American people