Illinois’ cross-country’s Audrey Blazek has stayed healthy throughout the season — something she didn’t do her sophomore year.

On paper, Blazek’s season may have seemed normal for a typical Division I athlete, but it was far from that.

“I really didn’t like running that much (early on in my life),” Blazek said.

There have been many obstacles for Blazek to overcome over her career.

Blazek started off as a soccer player all through grade school. It wasn’t until the age of 12 that her closest friends encouraged her to join the middle school’s intramural cross-country team.

It wasn’t her ideal sport, but she decided to work with it.

She continued to run through seventh and eighth grade, still not enjoying running countless miles after school. In high school, her parents encouraged her to stick with the sport that she would ultimately start to love.

“Running had started to be something that I enjoyed,” Blazek said. “It made and still makes me happy when I’m running out there, but also the team aspect wasn’t something that I was ready to give up going out of high school.”

After her first visit to Illinois, getting to know the team and what it was about, she knew that this was the place where she would like to run another four years.

She would start her freshman season better than her teammates. Blazek was one of two freshman to compete for the Illini at the 2013 NCAA Midwest Regional race.

“The standards of the meet were so elevated from high school,” Blazek said. “It was a similar environment from what I was used to, but the competition and the atmosphere made it really cool to be there as a freshman.”

But at the end of her first spring with the Illinois women’s track and field team, she discovered a pain in her foot. She continued to work out as usual, but the injury would leave and come back throughout the entire spring season and summer training.

She later found out that it was an inflamed tendon.

“I spent a lot of time in the training room,” Blazek said. “ That’s also something that was new from high school; we didn’t have a training room like that. It was amazing having one here and being able to go in and do the rehab.”

By the fall of her junior year, she was ready to get back to work with countless hours of training. During her season coming back from the injury, she became the Big Ten Sportsmanship Award recipient.

This year, she came back faster than ever. She led the Illinois women’s cross-country team at four meets, set a new 6k personal record and placed third overall at the Iowa Regional Preview.

Blazek mentioned that she has had some better training in the past year than she has had previous years.

“Audrey’s greatest strength is that she’s very methodical and consistent,” head coach Scott Jones said. “She has a vision for what she wants to be accomplished, and that’s what contributes to her success.”

On and off the course, she holds a leadership position to her teammates and even her coach.

“I think her greater contribution to the team has been all of the things that she does outside of practice,” Jones said. “She’s somebody I consult with and delegate responsibility to. She really is a leader and is someone that I have 100 percent confidence in.”

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