BILLINGS — Just over a year ago, Dani Aragon was starting a full-time job, but with one more U.S. Olympic Trials just over the horizon, she wasn’t sure if it was time to hang up her spikes quite yet.
“I had talked to this coach a little bit and kind of felt like I wanted to see if I can make one last Trials so I talked to him and came up to North Carolina,” the former Billings Senior Bronc said from her home on the East Coast on Saturday.
So in December, she moved to join a new training group in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, to be coached by Puma Elite’s Alistair and Amy Cragg.
“It’s been fun to kind of be in a new place and part of a new team and just have really great training partners so, yeah, it’s been really fun for me to get to still be doing this,” Aragon said.
Aragon will make her second career appearance at the U.S. Olympic Team Trials when she runs the women’s 1,500 meters at 6:23 p.m. (MDT) Thursday in Eugene, Oregon.
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Training and competing at an elite level for multiple years takes its toll, but Aragon had a few reasons to make another run.
“I feel like if you don’t run your last season, and it’s an Olympic year, you’ll have a lot of regrets,” Aragon, a collegiate standout at Notre Dame, said. “I didn’t want to leave the sport with regrets …I’m honestly just having fun with the sport and I like the process. I like training. So I felt like why not? Kind of try one more situation and see how it goes.”
In addition to her new training group, the new situation has involved being an analyst at a financial company in a fully remote role for a company based in a different time zone. It has allowed her to pursue both professional and athletic goals.
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