Young Campbell runs a fast bend to gold

When Veronica Campbell settled into her blocks at the start of the Olympic 100m final on Saturday 21 August she was just another bright young sprinter with hopes of glory. The 22 year-old Jamaican finished third behind the Belarussian Yuliya Nesterenko and USA’s Lauryn Williams.

The most successful Jamaican of all-time

Just a week later, Campbell had two gold medals from the 200m and 4x100m hanging around her neck alongside the 100m bronze. She was no longer just another member of sprinting’s 'new generation', but the most successful female Jamaican Olympian of all time.

Campbell now has four medals from two Olympic Games – at just 18 she was a member of the 4x100m relay squad that won silver in 2000, and a teammate of Jamaica's most famous female sprinter Merlene Ottey. At exactly twice Campbell's age, Ottey competed for Slovenia in Athens, her seventh Olympics, but failed to add to her record eight medals and 13 final appearances from previous Games.

Ottey’s influence

After their stunning relay victory last Friday Campbell sat beside her teammates, Tayna Lawrence, Sherone Simpson and Aleen Bailey, and talked about Ottey's influence on her and her generation.

"Merlene is one of my role models and has always been my idol," said Campbell. "She was up at the village yesterday and told us that we could break the national record and win the gold medal. It was a very grand gesture from her, an inspiration, and we all felt we must win it here for her tonight."

Ottey fell out with the Jamaican Federation in Sydney, prompting her to take Slovenian citizenship, but she clearly still holds a special place in the hearts of all Jamaican athletes, especially young women sprinters like Campbell. If Ottey's blessing wasn't reason enough to win the relay, the Jamaicans had two other powerful sources of motivation.

Jones spurs the team on

One came from the mouth of Marion Jones, the USA's multi-medal winner from Sydney, a woman once considered virtually unbeatable over the 100m. Jones famously tried to win five golds in 2000 but came up short in the long jump and the 4x100m, where she had to be satisfied with bronze. Jones was in the US relay team in Athens which, after running 41.67 in the semi-finals, was a clear favourite.

Asked whether she was nervous about running against the US, Campbell's answer was firm. "No, I wasn't nervous, I was very determined," she said. "Marion did an interview before, saying that any team that was going to beat the US has to run a World record. Well, tonight we have not run a world record and we have won."

Not wanting to look foolish

The third spur to success came from the eye-catching, off the shoulder costumes the Jamaican quartet wore for the final. As Campbell explained, wearing such glamourous outfits was one thing, but wearing them and not winning could only make them look foolish. "They were designed specially for the final," she explains. "And as I said to the girls before we went out, 'Wearing a suit like this we have to win.'"

In the event, it was the USA, and Jones in particular, who looked foolish, while Campbell and her colleagues fulfilled Ottey's predictions, sweeping to victory in 41.73, a national record indeed.

Seventh gold

It was Jamaica's seventh athletics gold at an Olympic Games and only their second ever in a relay, the first having come 52 years ago in the men's 4x400m with a squad containing such famous Jamaican quarter-milers as Arthur Wint, Herb McKenley and George Rhoden. Such was the delight and pride in Jamaica at that triumph that the nation took a national holiday.

Inspiration for the Campbell's relay victory may have come, in their different ways, from the words of Ottey and Jones, but the driving forces behind her individual achievements come from much further back.

In the beginning

Born in Clarkes Town, Trelawny, Campbell is one nine siblings. Her father, Cecil Campbell, left when she was one, and Veronica was brought up by her mother, Pamela Bailey, in St Catherine. But she always remains close to both.

"My mother and my father have been my inspiration all my life," she says. "They’ve been beside me a lot. Because she needed money to send me to school, my Mum had to get up at three o'clock in the morning to get me on the bus and accompany me to school and back."

Running came naturally and early. "I was talking to my Dad the other day," she says. "He was telling me that he used to run back in his days, so I realised I get my running from him.

"I started at school I suppose. I was playing out a lot, running and playing with balls and all that. I realised I always beat my friends. And then I entered a couple of local championships and won a few races.”

Guided by Collins and Myton

It was then that a teacher she calls 'Mr Collins' took her under his wing and became her first coach. "He saw the potential in me and motivated me," she says. "He made me believe I could do well."

Another great influence was Neville Myton, a friend of the family and former middle distance runner who ran 800m and 1500m at the 1964 and 1968 Olympics. Along with his wife Paulette, 'Mr Myton' has been something of a mentor to Veronica and other young Jamaican athletes, as well as a great support to her.

"They are really lovely," says Campbell. "Just awesome. They are like my second parents. They try and lead me down the right path. If he asked me to jump over the moon, I would ask him 'How?' 'When?' because I trust him completely."

World Youth and Junior success

By 16 Campbell was running for Jamaica at the 1998 World Junior championships, where she made the quarter-finals. The following year she won World Youth titles at 100m and 4x100m, and in 2000, after lapping up her first Olympic experience, flew on from Sydney to Chile where she became the first woman to win the 100m and 200m double at the World Juniors.

By now Campbell was more than just a local teeenage star from Clarendon High School in Trelawny. Her name was buzzing across the radar screens of world athletics, being talked about as one to look out for on the senior stage, even mentioned as the next Merlene Ottey.

Injuries in 2001 and 2003

But 2001 was a difficult year and a hamstring injury kept Campbell out of the World Championships in Edmonton. In the autumn she left Jamaica, moving from Vere Technical College on a scholarship to Barton County Community College in Kansas, USA, where she met her current coach Lance Brauman.

As a freshman she won four national titles in the 60m, 100m and 200m, indoors and out, and in 2002 was back on the international scene, winning two Commonwealth Games silver medals in the 100m and 4x100m. But 2003 was another troubled year, as injury again kept her out of the World Championships.

Background the key

Campbell moved to the University of Arkansas and, conscious of the long season a US college athlete has to endure, Brauman changed her training, gearing it specifically towards the Olympic Games. "The secret of my success here has been my training," said Campbell after winning the 200m. "I've done a lot of background work, trying to get strong, so my body would be able to take me right through the season and run so many races at the Games."

Campbell, who completed 10 races in Athens, believes not running the NCAA championships early in the season paid huge dividends, helping her to remain fresh for Athens, and she pays tribute to her coach for getting her into such good shape. "He’s a great person. He’s like a father to me," she says. "He’s encouraging. At my training sessions, he’s there, always – he will watch me do my warm up, everything. He takes care of me."

Studying her rivals

Campbell's careful preparation was one of the key factors behind her success. Before the 200m final she studied the races of her rivals, especially the 19 year-old American Allyson Felix, and concluded that she needed to run a fast bend to win the gold. "It was important to run the way I did," she said afterwards. "That's why I ran a hard curve. I'd been expecting the gold, and I knew that with the perfect race I would win for sure. When I got to the straight and I didn't feel Allyson anywhere I knew I had the race won."

So young, so much success

Campbell's time, 22.05, was not only a personal best, but eclipsed her own world leading time for the year. When she added the relay gold and national record just two days later it completed Campbell's triumphant Games. The fact that she has achieved in just two Olympics, and at such a young age, what her great inspiration had tried and failed to do for so long, is not lost on Campbell.

"What does it mean to have a gold medal when I’m just 22?" she wonders. "Maybe I’ve got to achieve more. Maybe I’ve got another two or three more Olympic Games to get more medals, I don’t know."

With four, she's already half way to Ottey's total, although we probably shouldn't expect her to be around quite so long. "I don’t know how long I am going to run for," she says. "I would like to start a family at some point, so I guess I need to make some money."

With medals in the bag and star status confirmed, that task should be somewhat easier than it was two weeks ago.

Matthew Brown for the IAAF