Young Leeds athlete lands scholarship at prestigious American university

Jasmine Trott, 18, only took up racing during the 2020 cross country season but her flair for running soon became evident.

A former Garforth Academy pupil, she joined athletics club Rothwell Harriers and has gone from strength to strength.

In August, she will be taking her talent across the pond to a university which competes at the highest level of intercollegiate athletics, NCAA Division 1 (D-1).

As part of the scholarship, she will be studying psychology away from the track.

In her early teenage years, Jasmine took part in park runs before joining a club on the recommendation of a friend.

"I used to do park runs when I was younger, I never really did proper training," she said. "When I was about 13 or 14, I used to do park run once a week and then I started getting quite good at it.

"My friend told me to join Rothwell Harriers and I started doing track sessions once a week as well as park run in 2019. I'd never been on a track before so it took me a while to get used to it."

The Covid-19 pandemic put a halt on many competitive sports but Jasmine utilised the first lockdown period to train and improve.

"You can look at it two ways," she said. "I think some people used lockdown as an excuse to not train but I just really wanted to get good.

"I felt a lot of competition with other people at the club and wanted to get to their level. I just put everything in during lockdown, I was always messaging my coach asking for training plans to do to get better. Lockdown definitely benefited me because I could put all my focus into running."

After racing for the first time in the 2020 cross country season, she began building experience and was eventually contacted by a recruiter who had taken notice of her ability.

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"I actually got contacted by a recruiter after the cross country season in 2021, because I did well in that and got into the inter-county competition and did quite well in that race. A recruiter contacted me and asked if I would be interested in going to a university in America.

"I explained it was very expensive and she said she had a lot of contacts with a lot of D-1/D-2 universities I got a few contacts - I got one from Colorado and one from Bryant, they were the main ones I was choosing between. We had some calls with their coaches and saw what they could offer me so I ended up getting a D-1 scholarship."

The United States now awaits for Kippax-based Jasmine.

"I'm very excited and I'm nervous," Jasmine said. "But you've got to take risks, haven't you?"