Cross Country, Track & Field
Favorite athlete: Shalane Flanagan
Favorite team: Villanova
Favorite memory competing in sports: During my junior year indoor season, our 4x4 team qualified for states. I anchored the relay, and with less than a hundred meters to go, I came from behind and beat another team at the line and we ended up getting a state medal!
Most embarrassing/funniest thing that has happened while competing in sports: During my sophomore track and field season, me and three other distance runners ran the 4x1 in an invitational and ended up winning the JV race.
Music on your mobile device: Mix of everything
Future plans: Attend University of Vermont!
Words to live by: “Somewhere behind the athlete you’ve become and the hours of practice and the coaches who have pushed you is a little girl who fell in love with the game and never looked back. Play for her.”
One goal before turning 30: To run a marathon
One thing people don’t know about me: I’m very superstitious about what I wear when I race.
By Ed Morrone
Last week was one of the best of Hayley Ross’s life, sprinting through the finish line and into a collegiate track commitment at the University of Vermont.
And to think, it could have never happened at all.
Ross, a senior track and cross country runner at Wissahickon High School, has endured her fair share of obstacles as it pertains to her sport. Those include, but are not limited to, not one but two stress fractures, as well as a recently diagnosed thyroid condition that affects memory, concentration and energy, an important trio of prerequisites for any competitive runner.
Despite sometimes dealing with frustration and self-doubt in the wake of these adversarial potholes (Who wouldn’t?), Ross has endured. After all, one of the beauties of running is that it can and should serve as a stress reliever rather than something that causes and compounds the pressures of everyday life.
“One of the main reasons I started running was to relieve stress from the school day,” said Ross, a day after she returned to spring track competition following her second stress fracture. “Not only that, but also everything that was going on with the college process, and work (Ross also holds down a job at Starbucks in addition to her other responsibilities).
“When I get to practice, the team is always there for me whether I’m having a good or bad day. Running can add stress during races, but it’s also something that helps me work toward my goals, and being around the team makes me not worry about anything else during that hour or hour-and-a-half of practice. It’s always the best part of my day.”
Ross started running track in fourth grade, and played softball for a time before dropping that to take up cross country to pair with track in seventh grade.
“I liked the individualized aspect of it, and how I perform determines not only my success, but the overall success of the team,” she said. “How much success you have is determined entirely on how hard you’re willing to work.”
Ross has certainly had her high points as a runner at Wissahickon. She qualified for indoor states in the 800-meter race as a sophomore, junior and senior, and said her favorite memory in competitive running was anchoring the 4x400-meter relay in last year’s indoor season, earning a medal.
“We (myself and opponent) crossed the finish line at the same time, and looking up at the scoreboard and seeing I beat her was the best feeling in the world,” she said. “She was ahead of me with 100 meters to go and I came back, and had I not we wouldn’t have medaled. In that moment, all of the hard work and everything I had accomplished to that point was worth it.”
However, there have also been plenty of valleys to go with Ross’ personal peaks, all related to the stress fractures and thyroid condition, which sapped her energy and spirit to the point where she wasn’t sure if she wanted to pursue running in college, or even worse, that prospective coaches wouldn’t be interested in her because they thought she was injury prone.
Luckily for Ross, she is surrounded by a rock-solid support system, which starts with her family but also includes Wissahickon cross country and track coach Heidi Butt. To say that Ross and Butt don’t possess the typical coach-athlete relationship would be a massive understatement. Yes, Butt cares for Ross and wants her to succeed, the same way all good coaches look out for the athletes on their respective teams.
However, the duo’s relationship runs even deeper than that. Ross has known and been best friends with Butt’s daughter long before her Wissahickon track days began. The two families live in the same neighborhood, and Butt often drove the carpool that shuttled her daughter and Ross to school.
“I’ve known her since she was a little girl, as a human and good friend before I knew her as a fast athlete,” Butt said. “Yes, she’s been a varsity contributor in all the running sports since ninth grade, but I knew her first as a girl and she knew me as a mom before she knew me as a coach. I’ve seen her become more mature and comfortable within herself. We giggle a lot in the car, so it’s certainly not your typical coach-athlete relationship.”
From her perspective, Ross referred to Butt as “a second mom.”
“She knows when I’m having a bad day, how to support me, how to push me, but also how to rein me in if she sees I’m pushing too hard,” Ross said. “I’m not good at knowing the point where I have to rest or take a break, and Mrs. Butt knows me well enough to know if I’m pushing myself too hard. I’ve never had a relationship with a coach as I’ve had with her. She truly knows what’s good for me and what’s not.”
Butt has been there for Ross to lean on as she has endured the health issues that have sometimes limited her ability to participate in track or cross country. Butt said Ross’ medical issues have come and gone over the years, and her first instinct was as a mom and human being in helping one of her most talented runners work through the problems as they have risen.
“Hayley is a very bio-centric student, and I teach biology at the school so we overlap in a lot of places,” Butt said. “So in addition to the track aspect, I understood her frustration from the academic level in that she was having problems concentrating and carrying that around with her. My job was to listen, push when I need to push and hug when I need to hug.”
Ross began the college process in the winter of her junior year, but her injuries instilled some doubt in whether or not she still wanted to compete and continue to put her body through the physical and medical stresses she was enduring. However, Vermont landed on her radar when the school’s girls track coach, Matt Belfield, reached out to her to express his interest in her joining the program, and his interest remained even after he became aware of the health maladies that were bothering Ross.
“He came and visited me at my house and met my parents,” Ross said. “Just meeting him, I knew it would be a good coach-athlete relationship. He was very supportive and told me that everyone gets injured in sports, and he was OK with that.
“It gave me more confidence on where I wanted to go, even if Vermont was seven hours away from home and much more expensive being an out of state school. I wanted to go where I was wanted, and I didn’t have to fight for myself. He fought for me and had faith that I’d be able to succeed at that level.”
Now that Ross has returned to competition for the spring outdoor season, she’s focused on finishing her high school running career with a bang. She said her remaining goal was to set her personal record in the 800, which she hasn’t done since her sophomore year at districts.
“I want to come back and prove people wrong who didn’t think I could succeed this season,” Ross said. “I have limited time left, so even if I only make it to districts and not beyond to states, it would still be a big thing for me.
“Making states is still a goal, but it may not be realistic based off the training I’ve got in or the running I’ve done. So, make it to districts and PR is my main goal, and if I don’t make it to states, I’ll always have the medal from last year.”
Of course, Ross has a lot more on her mind than just running. She’s interested in working in the healthcare field, possibly as a nurse or genetics researcher, noting that Vermont has a well-regarded school of nursing. The AP biology course she took helped put her on track toward what she wants to do with her life, and she’s currently enrolled in an anatomy class that she’s found interesting and fits the math and science portion of how her brain operates.
In addition to figuring out what she wants to do with her life, Ross is holding down her aforementioned job at Starbucks. Not only that, but her sister had a baby in November, and she helps care for her infant nephew when called upon, something else that fits the mold of a future healthcare worker full of compassion for others.
“Learning how to take care of someone other than myself, I’ve never experienced that before,” she said. “Taking care of a newborn has been a big learning experience. You learn what’s good and what’s bad, and what you should or shouldn’t do when it comes to taking care of another person. It’s also taught me how important it is to manage my time and make sure I get done the things that are important.”
Although she may be a bit biased in her feelings toward Ross, Butt has also been around enough student-athletes to know who will be successful and who will struggle after completing high school. Sure enough, Ross falls into the former category.
“This year, what she went through with her thyroid condition that impacted concentration, she easily could have asked for a schedule change or fallen into ‘senior-itis,’” Butt said. “But she doesn’t lay off the academic work and stuck with the highest-level honors and AP courses. She also works and cares for her nephew and is involved with her church. She’s very goal-driven and doesn’t make excuses. I’m an adult and have a ton on my plate, so sometimes I wonder how she does it as a kid. It comes from the dedication and devotion and drive that not all kids have. She’s a young woman who has really blossomed, and I’m lucky to have been a part of that.”
Although running has certainly come with its fair share of frustrations — much like anything worth pursuing in life — Ross claims that being a competitive runner has molded her into the person she has become and will become, considering she will be competing for at least another four years.
“It’s shaped me as a person, and I don’t think I’d be who I am today without it,” she said. “It’s a big aspect of my life, something that has taught me time management, and learning what’s good and important for me. On certain days, I can see that maybe running is not the most important thing and it’s time to focus on some other things going on in my life.
“More than anything, it’s shown me the importance of everything else I have going on. The biggest lesson I’ve learned as a runner and a person is how to be part of a supportive team, one that always pushes each other and works well together and helps each other get through the day.”
