Haeley Johnson remembers the first time she started running.

“About fifth grade, I started doing the Show-Me-Games with my dad, and my mom was always there,” the Montgomery County graduate said.

Johnson went on to enjoy an outstanding 10-year track career that officially ended in May at the Great Lakes Valley Conference Championships while competing for the University of Missouri-St. Louis.

When she was at Montgomery County Middle School, Johnson set school records in three events. At MCHS, she competed at the Class 3 state meet three times and won Eastern Missouri Conference championships in the 100 and 200 in her junior year. In her three years at UMSL, Johnson was one of the team’s top performers in the sprinting and jumping events.

Johnson will attend Missouri State University next fall to pursue a Master’s degree in occupational therapy, meaning for the first time in 10 years she will not be doing any running. She graduated from UMSL with a Bachelor’s degree in exercise science in May.

“The workload for graduate school is a lot different than my undergraduate is,” Johnson said. “I think it’s time to focus on my studies through this part.”

Johnson competed in a total of 11 meets in the indoor and outdoor seasons for UMSL, an NCAA Division II school. She had three second-place finishes in the long jump, a third-place finish in the 100 at the McKendree Outdoor Classic on April 7 and a fourth-place finish at the Eastern Illinois University Early Bird meet on Dec. 9.

“This season was definitely my best for indoor and outdoor,” Johnson said. “I just wanted to leave everything out there with nothing to lose. I guess it kind of helped me a lot with my nerves. It kind of let me enjoy the sport for the last time and not worry about anything else.”

At the GLVC meet in Rolla, Johnson ran a personal-best time of 13.03 seconds in her 17th-place finish in the preliminaries of the 100-meter dash and placed 13th in the long jump in 15 feet, 2.75 inches.

“My last meet was definitely my best one,” Johnson said. “There were so many emotions going through my head the whole day. Jumping went really well. My 100 was the best that I’ve done since my freshman year. My nerves were everywhere, knowing that it was the last meet. For the conference meet, only the top 18 out of the whole GLVC conference get to go. I was happy that I was one of those 18 who qualified. I kind of had every emotion running through me the whole day.”

Johnson ran in six indoor meets this year. She set personal-best records in the 60-meter dash, the 300-meter dash and long jump during the indoor season.

“I definitely ran a lot indoors,” Johnson said. “We kind of used this indoor season to condition us for the outdoors and kind of get a feel of what events we were going to stick with. I had a couple of good meets with jumping. The 60 indoors went really well. That was a really good conditioning thing for me, getting started for outdoors.”

Johnson competed with the MCHS track team for three years. Her senior year was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

In 2021, Johnson joined the UMSL track team, which wrapped up its first year of competition. She said she enjoyed the experience of competing in track in college.

“The last three years definitely meant everything to me in college,” Johnson said. “I knew it was something I wanted to continue. I wasn’t ready to give it up just yet. I had continued support from my family and my friends. Honestly, it meant everything to have my family there behind me all three years. The friendships I made were definitely something I’ll keep with me for a long time, so that really meant a lot.”