BONNYVILLE – It is the adrenaline that comes with competing against oneself and others that keeps high school athlete Angelyn Stanley on the track and competing at event after event.
But being recruited to train with a National Collegiate Athletics Assocation (NCAA) Division I track program at Western Illinois University has been a nice feather to add to the cap of the Grade 12 École Notre Dame High School student.
Stanely started her track career back in Grade 5. By Grade 8 she had joined the Lakeland Yellowjackets, an athletics club that meets and trains in Bonnyville.
The all-around athlete has also participated in every school sport that her schedule would allow, having recently been a part of the group that won 2A Zones in badminton.
Preparing for life after high school, Stanley decided to create a profile on the NCSA College Recruiting app.
“You can make a profile and put videos in there, add things about yourself, write your personal bests in there, and what you want to do academically,” Stanley explained.
From there, coaches can review athletes' profiles and contact prospective students through the app.
Stanley vividly remembers the morning she woke up to a missed number with an American area code. Listening to the voicemail she learned that a coach from Western Illinois University wanted to offer her a scholarship to run with the Leathernecks’ track team.
The timing couldn’t have been more perfect because Stanley had been offered another athletics scholarship to Minot State University in North Dakota two days prior and she was about to commit.
“I told them the situation, and I was like, ‘I'm kind of in a time crunch. I was just about to commit to another school,” she recalled.
The recruiters from Western Illinois asked to speak with Stanley and her family right away. That same morning, a course for both Stanely’s academic and athletic future had been set.
But before Stanely heads south of the border to start studying for a Bachelor of Forensic Science and training with her new track team in August, she had to finish competing in her last year of high school track and field events.
The 2023 track and field season has shaped up to be another great year for achieving new personal bests for Stanley, who competed in long jump, triple jump, 100 meter and pole vault.
While competing in Districts, Stanley finished in first place in all four of her track events.
Qualifying for NEASAA Zones, Stanley earned a personal best in long jump, along with the first-place spot once again. She also earned gold in triple jump and pole vault, with another personal best.
Stanley would also come in second place for the 100-metre event, after finishing a tenth of a second behind the first-place runner.
Finishing all her Zone events in the top two spots, Stanley attended Track and Field ASAA provincials held at Foote Field in Edmonton on June 2 and 3.
Competing against athletes from across the province, Stanley finished fourth in senior women's pole vault, a sport she started training in for the first time this year. She would also finish eighth in the preliminary 100-metre dash, 12th in long jump and 13th in triple jump.
For Stanely, sprinting and jumping has always had a certain appeal.
“Just the feeling it gives me while competing is a really addictive because there's so much adrenaline going. And of course, there's always going to be good days and bad days, but the feeling when you're having a good day and competing well – there’s nothing like it,” she said. “Experiencing that progression and success is a great feeling.”
Ready to set out on the next challenge, the Bonnyville native said, “I'm a little nervous to be away from everyone that's really close to me in my life, but I'm ultimately excited to experience something new.”