By Mark Carpenter
People’s Defender
May 8 was the culmination of a whole lot of hard work for Manchester senior sprinter Madison Dunn. On that day, friends and family gathered in the Manchester Educational & Activity Center to be on hand as Dunn signed her letter of intent to become a member of the women’s track program at the University of Rio Grande. Over the course of her high school career, Madison has continually improved and is now one of the area’s top performers in the 100M Dash, the 200M Dash and the 400M Dash.
“I checked out a bunch of different colleges but when I went to Rio Grande, I just fell in love with the school and the program,” said Dunn. “They reached out to me and I went on a visit and we had a good conversation.”
“I’ve learned in high school that you always have to work hard for what you want, no matter if you are uncomfortable or not. There’s a lot of not being comfortable in running and you just have to push through it to meet your goals. I’ve had so much support from my family and my Dad took the track coaching position here just to help me get better and that means a lot to me. I’ve really just tried to push myself as much as I can but I have always had great support and motivation. It’s been like the past year that I started thinking that I might be able to run track in college and that has worked out really well.”
As Madison mentioned, her father Chris is now part of the high school track coaching team at Manchester, juggling the duties of proud parent and dedicated coach.
“Maddie has always loved to run but she could never quite get to that next level,” said Chris. “There was a particular loss at a track meet that really bothered her and she told me ‘Dad, I want to do this legitimately.’ So we started in the weight room and she made it to the district finals last season and after that she decided she was going to train full-time.”
One of the things that Dunn did to improve her performance was to participate in indoor track during the colder months.
“The indoor track experience was great,” said Chris. “Everyone there is focused on what they are doing, not a lot of socializing, it’s all business. She was running her best times and finishing like fourth and she eventually made it to state in indoor and realized then that she belonged, which was huge for her confidence.”
“If you know Maddie, you’ll admire so much about her. As a parent, to see the work she put in paying off makes you proud. You pray that your kids have a good work ethic but you can’t make it happen for them. To see all this materialize, it’s really hard to describe.”
Also on hand for the signing ceremony was Rio Grande women’s track coach Matt Paxton and he spoke about his newest recruit.
”We are super excited about Maddie,” said Coach Paxton. “Her drop in times from last year to this year have been phenomenal. We know she’s a hard worker and she is very interested in getting better and we are trying to build a culture of hard workers. We want people who have the talent but also the will to go to the college level and do things the right way, athletically and academically. I expect her to do the same events she is now but it will be interesting to see if she wants to add or try anything else.”
Dunn will finish up her Associate’s Degree by the end of July which will leave her two years at Rio Grande where she plans to double major in Exercise Science and Business.