Meet Warren Weir – A High Flyer On and Off the Track

After the Beijing Olympic Games a lot of juniors started leaning towards athletics. We are certainly seeing more professionals coming out of the sport in Jamaica – there are now a lot of young Warrens and young Yohan Blakes moving up the ranks every single day.

In high school I was a hurdler, but didn’t know I would go to the Olympic Games and run the 200m or come into the 2016 season with a time of 10.06. I wanted to be a track and field Olympian and there are more and more athletes like that, not immediately knowing what sport they want to do but they are trying every day to get there.

My cousin was an Olympian, Debbie-Ann Parris, she was a 400m hurdler and now coaches at a university in the US. So I think some genes came from there. Back then, it wasn’t so serious as Olympians used to have day jobs and then track and field but now it is full on. Track and field is our day job.

In high school I found out that I had the talent to take track and field to another level. I said to myself I most definitely want to run in those packed stadiums and achieving that was an awesome feeling.

My favorite place to race is in London. I’m so sad that the Olympic Stadium track is no longer there. For the 2012 Games in the heats of the 200m in the morning it was a jam-packed stadium, and then going back for the semi-finals it was the same and the final again. That experience was just wonderful!

Staying home, watching TV, playing games, that’s how I spend my rest days. I do a lot of photography and now I do a lot with drones. I started a few years back as a hobby and then a friend of mine asked me to come and drone something for his company. From that I started a company. So when I’m not at home resting, I’m somewhere with my team getting footage for a client.