The un­time­ly death of Olympian De­on Lendore in a hor­rif­ic car crash in Hous­ton, Texas, has robbed this coun­try of one of its bright­est track and field stars.

No­tably, he is be­ing re­mem­bered not on­ly for his ath­let­ic achieve­ments -he was a bronze medal­ist (4x400m) in the 2012 Lon­don Olympics and a 2015 World cham­pi­onship sil­ver medal­ist (4x400m) - but as a re­mark­able hu­man be­ing and true T&T pa­tri­ot.

Among the count­less trib­utes that had been pour­ing in, one that sums up the young sports hero’s re­mark­able lega­cy came from the T&T Olympic Com­mit­tee who de­scribed him as “an in­spi­ra­tion and mo­ti­va­tion to us all both on and off the track.”

Heart­warm­ing sto­ries have been shared about his pos­i­tive in­ter­ac­tions with fel­low ath­letes be­hind the scenes at sport­ing events, his ex­pres­sions of gen­uine sup­port and en­cour­age­ment even dur­ing times of in­tense com­pe­ti­tion.

So, it is not sur­pris­ing that De­on Lendore’s loss is be­ing felt keen­ly, not on­ly by his im­me­di­ate fam­i­ly but by his ex­ten­sive cir­cle of loved ones, friends, and col­leagues in his home­town of Ari­ma, his Abi­lene Wild Cats club mates, school and uni­ver­si­ty col­leagues at Queen’s Roy­al Col­lege and Texas A&M, and many oth­ers with whom he in­ter­act­ed.

Just 29 years old, he rep­re­sent­ed this coun­try at three Olympic Games – Lon­don 2012, Rio de Janeiro 2016, and the Tokyo Games last year.

He made his Olympic de­but in Lon­don, join­ing fel­low Team TTO sprint­ers Jar­rin Solomon, Ade Al­leyne-Forte and Lalonde Gor­don to cap­ture bronze in a time of 2:59.40. He al­so earned three bronze medals at the World In­door Cham­pi­onships. In 2016 in Port­land, Unit­ed States, Lendore placed third in the men’s 400m and 4x400m events.

In 2018, he missed out on a medal at the Com­mon­wealth Games in Gold Coast, Aus­tralia, plac­ing fourth but one year lat­er, was al­so part of the his­toric 4x400 men who won gold at the World Re­lays in Yoko­hama, Japan in 3:00.81.

He was al­so a 4×400m bronze medal­ist at the Pan Am Games in Li­ma, Pe­ru in 2019.

Born Oc­to­ber 28, 1992, De­on Lendore was the pride of his com­mu­ni­ty, Mt Pleas­ant, Ari­ma, and at­tend­ed Ari­ma Boys Gov­ern­ment be­fore mov­ing on to QRC, then Texas A&M Uni­ver­si­ty in the US where he was a busi­ness ma­jor.

At the time of his death, he was serv­ing at Texas A&M as a vol­un­teer as­sis­tant coach. Re­ports are that he was on his way home from prac­tice at the time of the crash.

Ac­cord­ing to many in the sport­ing fra­ter­ni­ty, the Olympian was poised for greater things, aim­ing to bring more sport­ing glo­ry to T&T in this year’s Com­mon­wealth Games in Birm­ing­ham, Eng­land and the World Cham­pi­onships in Ore­gon in the US.

At age 29, the ex­pec­ta­tion was that there were many more ac­com­plish­ments ahead on the track, as well in var­i­ous oth­er spheres of en­deav­our.

To­day, a na­tion mourns this beloved son whose ath­let­ic achieve­ments brought us many mo­ments of joy and cel­e­bra­tion for which he was ho­n­oured with a na­tion­al award, Hum­ming­bird Gold.

We have lost a true cham­pi­on.