were held at the Mayagüez Athletics Stadium. Puerto Rican athletes participated in the 2011 Special Olympics World Summer Games, competing in the 12, 50, 100, 200, 400, 800 and 1,500 metres, as well as relay and shot put. A survey in 2011 found that 75% of Puerto Rican university student athletes that attended private institutions of higher learning partake in this discipline. Eight of the 23 athletes competing at the 2012 London Olympics, were track and field: Jamele Mason (400 metre hurdles), Eric Alejandro (400 metre hurdles), Beverly Ramos (3000 metre steeplechase), Enrique Llanos (110 metre hurdles), Héctor Cotto (110 metre hurdles), Miguel López (100 metre), Wesley Vázquez (800 metre) and Samuel Vázquez (1500 metros). Additionally, Javier Culson, who had become the first Puerto Rican track and field artist to be a flagbearer since the 1948 London Olympics, made history by becoming the first Puerto Rican track and field runner in an Olympic Game, to win the bronze medal at the 2012 London Olympics. He won it in the 400 metre hurdle competition. The Department of Education has pushed for field day events to not be limited to track and field since 2015, arguing that "it must allow the participation of all students regardless of differences and interests." In 2019, 16 track and field athletes competed in the Lima Pan American Games, of which 12 achieved minimum marks to qualify. Puerto Rico governor Pedro Pierluisi named retired long jumper and the University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez's Sport Affairs Director and lead coach Ray J. Quiñones Vázquez as Secretary of Sports and Recreation of Puerto Rico. The first event held at the Basilio Rodríguez Cruz Athletic Track, Carolina's running track, after its million-dollar recontrsuction after hurricanes Irma and María was the XV Spring Athletics Classic (Clásico Primaveral de Atletismo) a March 2021 Olympic and Paralympic qualafying event. A change in the qualifications for the athletic events at the 2020 Olympics by World Athletics, the sport's international federation, making the first criteria to qualify time or minimum marks, and the second ranking, was met with criticism in Puerto Rico. As most ranking events are held in Europe, making it less accessible from athletes from other continents. The ranking criterion is used to fill up vacant spaces. However, all four athletes whom met minimum marks, Jasmine Camacho-Quinn and Wesley Vázquez, Ryan Sánchez (the only debut in the quartet) and Andrés Arroyo, were