Alia Atkinson

She competed in the 50-metre freestyle, ranking 44th overall, and the 100-metre breaststroke, ranking 32nd overall.

She also competed in the 50-metre freestyle where she placed 37th overall.

Alia Shanee Atkinson, СD (born 11 December 1988) is a Jamaican five-time Olympian and a former competitive swimmer whose international competition career spanned 19 years, 2003 to 2021 inclusive, at the senior level.

At short course World Swimming Championships, she is a ten-time medalist in individual events, including four gold medals, four silver medals, and two bronze medals.

She won a total of 124 medals, of which 74 were gold medals, at Swimming World Cup circuits over the course of her career.

In 2000, when she was approximately 12 years old, her family permanently relocated to the United States, moving to Florida.

When she was 13 years old, she to focused her swimming on breaststroke specialization.

Before then she mostly swam freestyle and butterfly.

This made Atkinson the second Jamaican swimmer to place in the top four of a swimming event at an Olympic Games behind Janelle Atkinson who achieved the feat at the 2000 Summer Olympics in the 400-metre freestyle.

In the 200-metre breaststroke, Atkinson ranked 27th in the prelims.

She was coached by Chris Anderson from 2001 through to her retirement in 2021.

She mostly trained with the South Florida Aquatic Club swim team in Pembroke Pines, Florida in an Olympic-size swimming pool.

Atkinson was 15 years old and a high school junior at the time of her Olympic debut at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, Greece.

She won 14 total medals in individual events, 11 gold, 1 silver, and 2 bronze, from her first three Central American and Caribbean Games, in 2006, 2010, and 2018.

In March 2006, Atkinson competed at her first Commonwealth Games, the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne, Australia.

She carried the flag for her Jamaica at the opening ceremony of the 2007 Pan American Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where she set the Jamaican record in the 100-metre butterfly with a time of 1:02.40.

In the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, China she finished 25th in the women's 200-metre breaststroke.

In college, she majored in Psychology, earning her Bachelor of Science degree from Texas A&M University in 2010, where she also competed as part of the Texas A&M Aggies swim team.

In international swimming competitions, she represented Jamaica.

Atkinson stated her swimming mission in her SwimSwam bio as, "To place Jamaica on the world map of swimming; to agitate for the improvement of the infrastructural support for swimming in Jamaica so as to be able to take it to the next level; and to realize my full potential for myself, my parents, and my country."

She has also been vocal about not being related to Janelle Atkinson, who was the first Jamaican swimmer to finish in the top four at an Olympic Games.

She also competed in the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi, India in October.

She placed first in the 200-yard breaststroke at the 2010 NCAA Championships, swimming for Texas A&M.

Her swim made her the second NCAA champion in swimming for Texas A&M after Julia Wilkinson.

At the 2011 Pan American Games in Guadalajara, Mexico, Atkinson won the silver medal in the 200-metre individual medley.

At the 2012 Summer Olympics, she became the second Jamaican swimmer to place in the top four at an Olympic Games, finishing fourth in the 100-metre breaststroke.

Atkinson calls Roehampton, Jamaica her hometown.

At three years of age, she started swimming.

At the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, England, Atkinson competed in three individual events.

She qualified for the 2012 Olympics 100 m women's breaststroke final after defeating Canadian rival Tera van Beilen with a time of 1:06.79 in a head-to-head swim-off for a spot in the final.

She subsequently placed 4th in the final of the 2012 Olympics 100 m women's breaststroke finishing with a time of 1:06.93.

Following the 2012 Olympics, Atkinson competed in the 2012 World Swimming Championships conducted in short course metres and held in Istanbul, Turkey in December 2012.

She won the silver medal in the 50-metre breaststroke with a time of 29.67 in the final.

In the final of the 100-metre breaststroke, she swam a 1:03.80 and won the silver medal.

In 2014, Atkinson became the first Afro-Jamaican to win a world title in swimming, winning the short course 100-metre breaststroke at the 2014 World Swimming Championships with a world record time of 1:02.36.

She won two medals at the 2014 Commonwealth Games in the summer of 2014, silver in the 50 m breaststroke and bronze in the 100 m breaststroke.

She also set two Commonwealth Games records in the heats and semifinal of the 50 m breaststroke.

Her swim of 2:25.48 in the long course 200-metre breaststroke set a new national record for Jamaica in the event.

In 2016, she tied her world record in the short course 100 metre breaststroke on 26 August before setting a new world record in the short course 50-metre breaststroke on 26 October.

Two years later, on 6 October 2018, she set her second new world record in the short course 50-metre breaststroke, marking her fourth world record time in an individual event.