ATU Alumna Bounds Selected to Team USA

Arkansas Tech University alumna Kaitlin Bounds represented her country as a member of Team USA at the 2017 World Para Athletics Championships track and field competition in London, England, July 14-23.

Bounds, who was diagnosed with autism at age 4, was among 50 athletes representing the United States of America in the event.

It was the first major international track and field competition since the Paralympic Games Rio 2016.

Bounds’ top performance in London was a fourth-place finish in the 800-meter run on Sunday, July 23. She set a new personal best by completing the race in two minutes, 23.52 seconds.

Her time was three seconds faster than her previous best in the event.

Bounds also competed in the 1,500-meter run for her classification and finished eighth with a time of 4:55.49 on Monday, July 17, with a time of four minutes, 55.49 seconds.

The selection to Team USA came on the heels of two gold medals won by Bounds at the 2017 U.S. Paralympics Track and Field National Championships in Los Angeles, Calif., in early June. She was victorious in the 800-meter and 1,500-meter runs at Drake Stadium on the campus of the University of California at Los Angeles.

A resident of Russellville, Bounds, 25, earned four letters as a member of the Arkansas Tech cross country program. She was named All-Gulf South Conference in 2010 and was a multiple academic all-conference honoree, earning recognition for her classroom performance in both the GSC and the Great American Conference.

Bounds graduated from ATU in 2014 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in history.

Based in Colorado Springs, Colo., U.S. Paralympics, a division of the nonprofit United States Olympic Committee, states on its website that it is “dedicated to becoming the world leader in the paralympic movement and promoting excellence in the lives of people with paralympic-eligible impairments, including physical disabilities and visual impairments.”