The 2024 Paris Olympics brought the best of the best athletes from around the world together, including Ramapo College Roadrunner Cheickna Traore ’23, who shared his aspiration to become an Olympian in an interview with Justin Walters of PIX11 more than one year ago on May 31, 2023. Talk about setting a goal and having the drive to accomplish it…

Traore entered Ramapo College as a distance runner and graduated as a sprinter, thanks to RCNJ Track & Field Coach Justina Cassavell and Assistant Coach Ackeme Brown. Cassavell recruited Traore from Innovation High School in Jersey City, as her next great 800M runner. In an NJ.com interview with America’s #1 Sports Columnist* Steve Politi, Cassavell shared that she first wanted Brown to work with Traore a bit on shorter distances to see how he did. “That was it,” she said. “I never got him back. He became so fast.”

The list of accomplishments and records shattered is impressive during Traore’s time at Ramapo, and it is hard to pick just one that is at the top. “The most meaningful accomplishment to me has to be my personal best time of 20.56 seconds in the 200-meter dash,” Traore shared in a Winter 2023 Ramapo College Magazine interview. It was only five months later that he bested that time when he won the 2023 NCAA DIII Men’s 200M dash in 20.25s.

Steven Fiumefreddo ’22, decorated RCNJ long-distance runner who won multiple NJAC championships in the 5000M and holds a school record, attended the Olympic Games and was able to reconnect with Traore. The two alumni were teammates through 2022, and are an example of the bond formed between Roadrunners inside and outside of the athletics program. Photos below are courtesy of Fiumefreddo.

Since that interview, and since graduating from Ramapo, Traore continued to set records, this time at the DI level as a Penn State athlete. It is safe to say that selecting the top moment has likely not gotten any easier for Traore.

PARIS, FRANCE – AUGUST 05:  Cheickna Traore of Team Cote D’Ivoire competes during the Men’s 200m Round 1 on day ten of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 at Stade de France on August 05, 2024 in Paris, France. (Photo by Richard Heathcote/Getty Images)

Perhaps it is his personal best record, Penn State record, and Olympic-qualifying time of 19.93s from May 2024 in the NCAA DI East Regional. It could be the rare accomplishment of holding both NCAA DI and DIII national titles in the 200M in after being crowned champion at NCAA DI Outdoor Championships in June 2024. Maybe it is having made it to the Olympics representing his home country, Cote d’Ivoire, as he set out to do in Spring 2023.

FRANCE – JULY 26: Cheickna Traore and members of the Team Ivory Coast wave their national flag on a boat on the River Seine during the opening ceremony of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games on July 26, 2024 in Paris, France. (Photo by Lee Jin-man – Pool/Getty Images)

On a very warm August 5 afternoon, the Roadrunner community descended upon the Bill Bradley Sports and Recreation Center, where a banner of Traore hangs from the rafters. Dressed in Ramapo colors and branded shirts and hats, we gathered around the television in the Game Room to watch Traore run. We cheered ferociously, beaming with pride. On another part of campus, more than 130 first-year EOF students filled the H-Wing auditorium to watch an alumnus of the college they chose to enroll in, and one day become alumni of themselves, race across the screen in Paris. Traore ran an impressive 20.54s in the qualifying Round 1 and, due to injury, was unable to race in the Repechage Round. We witnessed an Olympic athlete…a Roadrunner…race in the most recognizable and coveted athletics competition.

Traore ’23 may have graduated, but a banner with his image hangs from the rafters of the Bradley Center.

Traore’s future is bright. He will undoubtedly grace to Hall of Fame wall as the most decorated athlete. But it is his past, his time at Ramapo College, an NCAA Division III program school, that prepared him for the present at the 2024 Paris Olympics. Once a Roadrunner, always a Roadrunner.

To learn more about Ramapo College Athletics, visit ramapo.edu/athletics.

*Voted by the Associated Press Sports Editors for 2024