The Barbados Olympic story began in 1952 when Ken Farnum, a Barbadian who at the time was the region's best cyclist, competed at the Olympic Games in Helsinki, as part of the Jamaica team.

With the formation of the West Indies Federation in 1958, Barbados became part of the West Indian team, which competed at the Olympic Games in Rome in 1960. It was at the Rome Olympics, that a Barbadian won the first and only Olympic medal. James Wedderburn was a member of the West Indies 4 x 400m relay team which placed third. Grantley Sobers, a weightlifter, was the other Barbadian representative on the West Indies team.

With the dissolution of the West Indies Federation in 1962, the Barbados sports fraternity moved towards seeking IOC recognition and the Barbados Olympic Association, the National Olympic Committee of Barbados, was formed in that year. While this gave Barbados the opportunity to compete in the Central American and Caribbean Games, the Pan American Games and Commonwealth Games, it was not until 1968 in Mexico, that Barbados as a nation participated for the first time in an Olympic Games.

Since those Games, the Barbados flag has flown at all Olympics with the exception of Moscow in 1980.

In Los Angeles in 1984, the men's 4 x 400m relay team secured a place in the final thereby becoming the first Barbadians since Wedderburn in 1960 to participate in an Olympic final. The team of Clyde Edwards, Elvis Forde, Richard Louis and David Peltier placed 6th.

At the Centennial Olympic Games in Atlanta sprinter Obadele Thompson and swimmer Leah Martindale became the first Barbadian athletes to contest individual finals at an Olympiad. Thompson placed 4th in the historic 200m while Martindale, the first black female