TAMPA, Fla. — Growing up, USF track star Romaine Beckford thought track and field only consisted of running.

Now a senior at USF, the Jamaican native has made history jumping — with the Bulls indoor track team.

What You Need To Know

  •  USF's Romaine Beckford makes school history

  • He brought home the school's first ever state title in the high jump 

  • Beckford grew up in Portland, Jamaica

  • He has eyes set on the Olympics

Romaine Beckford grew up in Portland, Jamaica, a town northeast of the island, just a little way from Kingston.

He grew up playing all types of sports.

He told Spectrum Sports' Katya Guillaume, “I was all about, like, just sports in general, was doing soccer and was doing track and field, I was doing cheerleading.”

He started running in primary school, but it wasn’t until he got into high school that he discovered track and field was more than just running laps.

“That’s when my high school coach I tried out basically every single event but the high jump was the one that stands out to me more," Beckford said.

He quickly put all his focus on that part of the sport.“For my first year, I couldn’t get anything at all," he said. "Everyone was like beating me and stuff, I never made the team to compete, nothing like that. And then I just found my level in the high jump and from there I just tell myself, 'I gotta work better so I can be a better person in the high jump,' so I think that’s where my journey starts in the high jump.”

His journey led him from Jamaica to South Plains Community College in Texas and now to South Florida here in Tampa, and he brought his big dreams along with him.

Beckford said, “It was just always thinking about becoming a professional athlete. I never knew at first what type of athlete I wanted to become because at first, all I knew about was just running in general until I went to high school.”

USF's assistant pole vault/high jump coach, Don Marsh told Spectrum, “He’s really the best competitor that I’ve ever been around. I’ve been around a lot of great athletes. He just knows how to compete.”

Marsh works very closely with Romaine as the high jump coach at USF.

“I’ve been coaching for over 50 years," Marsh said, "so I’ve had a lot of great athletes come and go, but he’s probably the most consistent performer I’ve ever worked with. He just seems, all his dedication is second to none to help himself over the past year, in terms of he's lost some weight which is really important in the high jump because you know you’re propelling your entire body over a bar.”

That hard work and dedication helped him achieve something he never thought he would, qualifying for the NCAA indoor track and field championships in Albuquerque, New Mexico. 

Beckford said, “I was just always working to be in the top 16 so I can go there and then just do whatever I do best, just compete to the best of my ability when I get to nationals.”

It’s already a hard task to qualify but Romaine didn’t just stop there. The college junior leaped over seven feet in the final, bringing home the gold medal for his school, something that’s never been done at USF. But he’s not done.

“I think for me I think there’s never a limit," he said. "You can always go beyond whatever you think you can do so I always open mind to think that there’s more wherever I go.”