Anna Witherspoon '19 Recruiting Profile

When I was younger, my mother put me in a lot of sports.  My first sport ever was competitive figure skating. I was only three years old when I started and usually came in first place in my competitions, I guess it helped that I had few competitors the same age as myself.  Just the same, I really enjoyed the feeling of receiving a medal for a good performance.  I did this for a few years, but I didn’t have a great passion for it, and without a lot of enthusiasm for this particular sport, you could only go so far, so that’s where it ended.  Over the next few years, I joined soccer, gymnastics, dancing, tennis, piano, singing, and finally acting.  I enjoyed these activities and was good at each one, but they only lasted a season or two and I was ready to move on to something new.  I finally decided to stay active in school activities and I really enjoyed and excelled at volleyball, basketball, and flag football.  I was also a fast runner too and I won every race at my first elementary school track meet.  I was told by the coach that I wasn’t able to run every event at the regionals, so I chose to run the 100m, 200m and hurdles. 

My parents and I really had no idea just how fast I was until I made the podium in all my events, however I didn’t come first.  I also didn’t realize until then just how competitive a person I was.  Although it was a good feeling being on the podium and having my friends cheer me on, I knew I had the potential to do better and I could hardly wait for the next track season to start.  The next year was pretty much the same thing though, I came second to the same girl from the year before in the 100m and 200m race, and second in the hurdles as well….not to bad I guess without any formal training.  It was at this point that I was asked to join a track club but I said I wasn’t ready for the long hours I would have to put in, still; I couldn’t wait for the year to pass so I could once again get the chance to beat this girl.  Same thing happened again, she beat me by a fraction of a second.  It was a little discouraging; however I was determined to beat her some day.  That day came when I was in grade 6.  Hands sweaty and heart pounding, I remember thinking at the starting line that this is it, I would give this every ounce of strength I could muster.  I finally did it, I won the race and my rival came a close second.  It was an amazing feeling and when my classmates congratulated me; I had tears in my eyes….this race really meant a lot to me.  I believe this was a turning point in my life.  When asked again by a coach to join their track club, this time I said yes because now I knew I had it in me.  I had a passion to be the very best I could be, and I realized that I had a real talent for sprinting.  It is a lot of training and a lot of hard work, but the hard work paid off when I had my greatest achievement at my first OFSSA provincial high school track meet.  I won gold medals in all of my 3 events.  I ran the 80 m Hurdles in 11.61 seconds, the 200 m Hurdles in 27.34 seconds, and the 200 m in 24.78 seconds.  I now rank Number 1 in Ontario and Number 2 in Canada.  I also make sure I keep my grades up as well as I know this is important.  I plan on writing my SATs in grade 11 and continue to improve my times on the track.