Chris Brown joined Laker Nation in September of 2018 as an assistant coach for the track & field program before taking over the men’s and women’s track & field teams in July 2019.
Chris “Fireman” Brown is a veteran of five different Olympic Games and is one of the most well-known sprinters to hail from the Bahamas. He has earned one gold medal (2012), one silver (2008) and two bronzes (2000, 2016). All four medals came in the 4x400m relay.
Clayton State Career Highlights (2019-Present)
- Finished Second in the 2024 Women's Peach Belt Conference Outdoor Championship, marking the best finish in any track & field Conference meet in school history.
- Mentored 14 College Sports Communicators (CSC) Academic All-District selections (ten on the women's side and four on the men's side)
- Mentored six USTFCCCA Indoor All-Region selections (four women & two men) and 12 USTFCCCA Outdoor All-Region athletes (five women & seven men)
- 32 Outdoor PBC Champions. Additionally, the Lakers earned a pair of conference champions in the Inaugural Indoor Championship meet in 2024.
- 100 Outdoor PBC Championships All-Conference selections and 32 Indoor PBC Championships All-Conference selections
- 14 new Indoor school records and 11 Outdoor school records broken during his tenure
Coach Brown completed his sixth season at the helm of the Laker track & field program in the 2024-25 season. This season saw the Lakers be very resilient and consistant. The men's team finished sixth in the outdoor championships while the women's team brought home a fourth place finish. The team saw several conference champions in the outdoor meet including the.women's 4x100m & 4x400m relays, Ivorie Smith in the 400m hurdles, and Freddie Hawkins earning victories. There were also many all-conference performances including Marley Tate taking second in the 400m dash and Davonte Jackson posting several top four finishes. Speaking of Davonte, he tied the school record in the long jump and became only the second Laker to break 7m in the long jump. The ladies 4x100m relay team also broke the school record in that meet. The Indoor Championships saw 14 all-conference performances while the women finished third and the men stood in fifth. The indoor season saw the women's 4x200m relay team break the school record twice. Brown also mentored three PBC Team of Academic Distinction and CSC Academic All-District selections.
Coach Brown completed his fifth year at the helm of the Laker track & field program in 2023-24. This season saw the Lakers reach new heights as he led the women's team to a second place finish in the Outdoor Conference Championship meet which is the highest finish in school history and they gathered the most points (109) in school history. The men finished in fifth. In the first annual Indoor Championships, both the men's and women's teams finished in fourth place. This season also saw 13 records fall including in the 100m dash with Christopher Hart breaking the record at the PBC Outdoor Championships finishing with a time of 10.52 and Kelvin Oppong breaking the 60m record in the indoor season with a time of 6.95 seconds. Of those 13 records broken, Ariyonna Jones took down eight of those. She broke the records in the indoor 200m, 300m, and 400m dashes and in the 4x200 and 4x400 meter relays while breaking the 200m and 400m dashes and the 4x100 meter relay records in the outdoor season. This season also saw Jones earn indoor and outdoor USTFCCCA All-Southeast Region honors in the 200m and the 400m dashes. Jones hit provisionally marks in the indoor 200m and the outdoor 200m and 400m dashes. Among the other records broken, Freddie Hawkins tied the school record in the indoor high jump, four relays saw records fall, and Sancho Smith and Tanaeya Johnson re-broke their school records in the indoor 600m run and outdoor 3000-steeplechase,respectively. In all, Coach Brown mentored two indoor PBC Champions and 12 outdoor PBC Champions to go along with 17 Indoor All-Conference and 26 outdoor All-Conference selections. Under Coach Brown's direction, The program saw three College Sports Communicators (CSC) Academic All-District honorees, three PBC Team of Academic Distinction selections, and 27 PBC Presidential Honor Roll selections.
Brown completed his fourth year as a head coach, in 2022-23, and brought the Lakers to new heights. The men's team saw their best finish at the PBC Outdoor Track & Field Championships in program history with a third place finish. The women's team matched last year's total with a fourth-place finish. Coach Brown also saw Adrianna Ameer and Freddie Hawkins earn USTFCCCA All-Southeast Regional honors. During the indoor season, the women's 4x200 meter relay team of Cayla Brown, Ajia Wall, Enesyice Kennemore, and Mikayla Osborne broke the school record finishing with a time of 1:47.25. On the men's side, the Lakers saw three records broken and a record tied. In the 500m run, Darryl Jefferson broke the school with a time of 1:06.89. Then, Camron Gaddis, who ran in his freshman season, broke the record in the 1000m run with a time of 2:35.97 and finally, however broken on two separate occasions, Sancho Smith, who also was a freshman, broke the record in the 600m run with a time of 1:22.43. Freddie Hawkins then tied the indoor high jump record of 2.00m.
The Lakers saw a pair of record-breaking performance outside on the track. In the 3K steeplechase, Tanaeya Johnson broke her own school record at the PBC Championships with a time of 12:11.22 and in the decathlon, Darryl Jefferson, who was the first Laker to compete in this event, finished the PBC Championships with a score of 4296. In all, Titus Hand won the 400m dash, making it the fifth straight 400m dash title at the PBC's. The men's 4x400 meter relay team also won their sixth straight conference crown and Freddie Hawkins won the high jump with a final mark of 1.95m. On the women's side, Adrianna Ameer became the first female Laker to win the PBC Female Track Athlete of the Year. The Championships saw 17 all-conference performances overall.
This season also saw four College Sports Communicators (CSC) Academic All-District and three PBC Team of Academic Distinction selections.
Brown completed his third year as head coach, and first featuring a full season in 2022. The Lakers ran in five indoor meets and six outdoor meets. During the course of the year, the men set three indoor school records in the 300m (Nigel Roulhac), 600m (James Kilgore) and 4x200m (Hand, Powell-Burgess, Roulhac and Winfrey). On the women’s side, the 300m indoor school record was set twice, first by Cayla Brown in her first collegiate meet before Ariyonna Jones broke it later in the season. The season came to an end at the PBC Championships with the Lakers taking three titles and 17 All-Conference selections. Nigel Roulhac won the men’s 400m, marking the fourth-straight win for the Lakers in the event while the Lakers also earned the four-peat in the men’s 4x400m relay. The women’s 4x100m relay team also earned the gold medal.
The 2020-21 season only featured an outdoor schedule as teams across the nation still battled the COVID-19 pandemic. Clayton State ran in six outdoor meets with both the men and women finishing in the top five in every meet. Newcomer Justin Johnson set the men’s long jump outdoor school record in his first meet with the Lakers before breaking it again at the PBC Championships. In that meet, Clayton State walked away with four titles, three on the men’s side (400m, 400m Hurdles and 4x400m Relay) and one on the women’s side (Triple Jump). At the end of the season, James Kilgore, Nigel Roulhac, Tylah Travis and Courtland White were named All-Region by the USTFCCCA for their performance in the men’s 4x400m relay. During the season, the men’s 4x400m relay squad finished first at every meet it raced in. Churchill Ezeokonkwo also contributed twice to the 4x400m success.
Brown’s first season as a head coach in 2019-20 was short lived as the team competed in five indoor meets and one outdoor meet before the COVID-19 pandemic cancelled the rest of the season. The season was looking good for the women’s team as the Lakers collected their first team win in program history at the Tiger Indoor Invitational, finishing 1-of-11. During the indoor schedule, five school records were set coming in the 55m (Nia Elmore), 60m (Kayla Williams), 200m (Jasmine Radford), 4x200m relay (Elmore, Jackson, Radford, Williams) and 4x400m relay (Allen, Elmore, Jackson, Radford). In the only outdoor meet of the season, the women placed 2-of-8 at the Savannah State Orange & Blue while the men finished fourth. The men also set a then school record in the 4x200m relay that season.
In his first year with the Lakers, Brown played a prominent role in helping numerous Lakers set program records and claim Peach Belt Conference individual titles. That season saw a program record 10 All-Conference selections for the women and five for the men. Among those Jasmine Radford won the 200m for the second straight year while Chris Florence repeated as 400m champion for the men. Florence was also a key member of the repeat champion 4x400m relay team. The relay squad became the first to accomplish that feat since Job Kemboi won the 5,000m in back-to-back years (2014, 2015).
Professional & Collegiate Career
Prior to his coaching debut, Brown’s professional career spanned two decades. The Fireman has won medals world-wide but reached the apex of his career on the grandest stage of them all – the Olympic Games.
Competing for the Bahamas as a 21-year-old, his first experience on that stage came in 2000 at the Sydney Olympics. There, he was part of a 4x400m relay team of Avard Moncur, Troy McIntosh and Carl Oliver that earned the Bronze Medal with a time of 2:59.23.
Brown would return to the games in 2004 in Greece, but it would not be until 2008 when he would see the medal stand again. That would come at the Beijing Olympics as he teamed with Andretti Bain, Michael Mathieu and Andrae Williams in the 4x400m, running a time of 2:58.03 to claim the Silver Medal. In those same games, Brown just missed out on a medal in the 400m, finishing in fourth place.
It wouldn’t be nearly so long a wait for his next trip to the podium and it would be the most satisfying yet. Competing at the 2012 London Olympics, Brown, Demetrius Pinder, Mathieu and Ramon Miller would best the United States for the 4x400m Gold Medal as they ran a time of 2:56.72.
Performances like that earned that group the name “The Golden Knights” in their native land. It was also the first Gold Medal for the Bahamas in a men’s competition, was a national record and was the third fastest time by a 4x400m relay in the Olympics.
On top of earning that medal, Brown also finished fourth in the 400m and served as the flagbearer for the Bahamas at the opening ceremonies.
He would return to the Olympic stage one more time at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Games and, as he had done in three of his four previous trips, would not come away empty handed. Teaming with Alonzo Russell, Mathieu and Steven Gardiner, he earned his fourth Olympic medal, claiming Bronze with a time of 2:58.49. In a show of the esteem that his country holds him in, he was named Team Captain of the Bahamas Olympic Team that year.
One doesn’t reach the Olympics without having an impressive international resume. Since entering the scene in 1997 he has earned a total of 28 medals at the international level, including seven gold, 10 silver and 11 bronze.
Among his most successful outings was the 2007 Pan American Games in Rio de Janeiro. There he earned gold in both the 400m and 4x400m relay.
He took bronze in the 400m and 800m at the 1997 CARIFTA Games and the gold in the 4x400m and silver in the 400m at the 2003 Central American and Caribbean Championships in St. Georges, Grenada. Two years later he would nearly replicate that feat with a gold in the 4x400m and bronze in the 400m on his home turf in Nassau, Bahamas.
Brown has also competed in at least eight biennial International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF) World Indoor Championships. Of the 20 medals the Bahamas has won in the history of that event, he possesses six of them, including one of the nation’s three gold medals.
The latter was earned in the 400m in Doha, Qatar in 2010 while he claimed silver in 2014 at Sopot, Poland (400m) and in 2016 in Portland, Oregon (4x400). His time of 45.58 in Sopot is still his personal best. He also picked up bronze in the 400m in Moscow, Russia (2006), Valencia, Spain (2008) and Istanbul, Turkey (2012).
His success also included the IAAF Outdoor World Championships. Also held every two years, Brown experienced great success in the 4x400m in his multiple trips. He earned the gold in that event in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada in 2001, bronze in Paris, France (2003) and silver in Helsinki, Finland (2005) and Osaka, Japan (2007).
Tough to beat anywhere, but especially in his native land, Brown delivered a pair of silver medal performances in 2014 and 2015. Those came at the IAAF Bahamas World Relays with times of 2:57.59 and 2:58.91, respectively.
Additionally, he currently holds the national record for the Bahamas in the 800m with a time of 1:49.57, had previously set the 4x400m relay mark on several occasions and owns a 400m personal best of 44.40. Brown has also held top five world rankings, hitting No. 2 in 2006, No. 3 in 2009 and No. 4 in 2005. Each of those times he was No. 1 in the Bahamas.
Prior to beginning what would be an illustrious international career, Brown starred at Division I Norfolk State University and in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference (MEAC) from 1998-2001. While there he was a two-time outdoor All-American in the 400m, earning those honors by virtue of third and fourth place finishes at the 2000 and 2001 NCAA Outdoor Championships, respectively.
He also set program records in the outdoor 400m (45.08) and sprint medley relay (3:19.71) and indoor marks in the 500m (1:03.25) and 4x400m relay (3:07.80). Brown also set the MEAC Outdoor Championship record in the 400m (45.60) and became the first NSU student-athlete inducted into that league’s Hall of Fame (2009). That same year he was inducted into NSU’s Hall of Fame.
Over the course of his career, Brown has earned a number of recognitions beyond what he has earned for himself on the track. These include being named the Bahamas’ National Team Captain in the 4x400m, Senior Male Athlete of the Year recipient (2005, 2006) and Senior Male Athlete of the Year and Athlete of the Year for Nassau, Bahamas (2012).
Additionally, he has been honored as an Exceptional Elite Athlete (Nassau, Bahamas - 2011), been a Bahamian Icon Award winner (2014) and was featured in the IAAF Feature Athlete: A Day in the Life Project series in 2014.
He has also received the Outstanding Performance Award on two different occasions, in 2008 for the Beijing Olympic Games and again in 2010. Rounding out those honors are the Tourism Award (Bahamas, 2016) and the Cacique Award (2017) presented by Cecil Rose Sports & Leisure (Bahamas).
A 2014 graduate of Norfolk State, Brown holds a Bachelor of Science in Interdisciplinary Studies.
Updated 5/29/2024
