Aleesha Barber

Who is Aleesha Barber?

Aleesha Barber is a Trinidadian sprint hurdler. She is a 2007 NCAA All-American honoree, a six-time Big Ten Conference champion, and a seven-time collegiate record holder. She set a personal best time of 12.85 seconds at the 2010 NCAA Eastern First Round Championships on the campus of North Carolina A&T State University in Greensboro, North Carolina. Barber also won a gold medal for the 100 m hurdles at the 2010 Central American and Caribbean Games in Mayagüez, Puerto Rico, clocking at 13.09 seconds.

Barber represented Trinidad and Tobago at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, where she competed in the women's 100 m hurdles. She ran in the fifth and final heat against seven other athletes, including Jamaica's Brigitte Foster-Hylton, and United States' Dawn Harper, who later dominated this event by winning an Olympic gold medal. She finished the race in fourth place by two hundredths of a second behind Kazakhstan's Anastassiya Pilipenko, with a national record-breaking time of 13.01 seconds. Barber, however, failed to advance into the semi-finals, as she placed eighteenth overall, and was ranked below two mandatory slots for the next round.