Two T-Bird Alumni Competing in Paris Olympics

Two former Cloud County Community College Thunderbirds, Leonie Beu and Rajindra Campbell, are in Paris, France to compete in the 2024 Summer Olympics.  Beu will compete in the women's 100-meter race representing Papua New Guinea, while Campbell will represent his home country of Jamaica in the men's shot put.

Beu was a member of the T-Bird women's track and field team from 2020-2022.  An eight-time All-American at Cloud County, Beu still holds school records as a member of the 2022 indoor 4x400-meter relay (3:44.15), 2022 outdoor 4x100-meter relay (45.55), and 2021 outdoor 4x400-meter relay (3:43.98) teams.  During her two years in Concordia, Beu helped guide the T-Bird women's track and field teams to back-to-back Region 6 Indoor track titles, back-to-back Region 6 outdoor track and field championships, and multiple top-five finishes at the national indoor and outdoor meets.

Following her two-years at Cloud County, Beu became a track and field student-athlete at Middle Tennessee State University in Murfreesboro, Tennessee.  The sprinter earned her spot in this year's Summer Olympics after setting a Papua New Guinea national record of 11.68 seconds in the women's 100-meter dash.

The women's 100-meter preliminary round is scheduled to begin at 3:35 am Central Time on Friday, August 2.

Campbell, originally from St. Ann's Bay, Jamaica, competed at Cloud County from 2015-2017.  During his two years as a T-Bird, Campbell established school records in the discus, as well as in both indoor and outdoor shot put.  Campbell was named the 2017 Men's Field Athlete of the Meet at that year's Indoor Region 6/Kansas Jayhawk Community College Conference West Multis in Pittsburg, Kansas, posting a then-school-record setting performance in the shot put with a throw of 17.50-meters.

Campbell later went on to compete for the Missouri Southern State University Lions.  While in Joplin, Campbell earned All-American honors in the shot put at the NCAA Outdoor Championships in 2019.  He set the program's shot put records for both indoor (20.07-meters), and outdoor seasons (19.99-meters) and holds the second best discus throw (58.73-meters) in Missouri Southern history.

Campbell punched his ticket to this year's Olympics after placing first in the shot put in the Jamaica Olympic Trials with a throw of 20.01-meters.

The men's shot put qualification round will take place Friday, August 2 at 1:10 pm Central Time.