Athlete Spotlight

Jenna Westaway, Women’s Track and Field

In her first and only season at the University of Guelph, star transfer Jenna Westaway put together one of the greatest single-season performances in the storied history of the Gryphon track and field program.

Westaway, a 24-year-old Calgary native, completed a geology degree in her hometown at the University of Calgary before arriving at U of G in 2018 as a graduate assistant. The fifth-year star enrolled in courses to expand her physiology background with a future focus on coaching in mind, and with one year of varsity eligibility left, she joined the defending national champion Gryphon track program.

It proved to be an excellent and influential decision.

Westaway helped the Gryphons women’s track team sweep team titles at both the provincial and national levels. At the OUA Track and Field Championships in Toronto, she ran the anchor leg on the

Gryphons gold-medal-winning 4x800m relay team. The very next day, Westaway boarded a plane and flew to Boston to take part in the 800m at the Boston University Last Chance Meet where she would put her name in our country’s record books by becoming the first Canadian women ever (collegiate or pro) to break the 2-minute mark indoors in the 800m with a time of 1:59.87.

Incredibly, it marked the second time that month that Westaway had established a new senior Canadian record after she also broke the 1000m record when she ran 2:37.04 at the Boston Valentine Invitational, surpassing the previous record time of 2:38.24 formerly held by Canadian Olympian Dianne Cummins. It was a record that had stood for nearly 16 years.

With an unforgettable February behind her, Westaway shifted her focus back to the collegiate ranks and once again delivered, stealing the spotlight at the U SPORTS Track and Field Championships in Winnipeg. There, Jenna took home three gold medals, topping the podium in the 1,000m (where she posted a U SPORTS record time of 2:41.36), the 1500m as well as the 4x800m where she contributed to the Gryphons gold medal-winning relay team. For her efforts, Westaway was named the U SPORTS Performer of the Meet and two weeks later was named the University of Guelph’s Female Athlete of the Year.

And while the historic success on the track was personally gratifying, Westaway suggested that being part of such an amazing group that embraced her from the beginning is what will stay with her.

“The connection, the camaraderie, and the competitive nature of the team was something else,” she said. “It was really unique and so uplifting. You would get into training sessions knowing you needed to bring your best for yourself and for your teammates. That creates accountability between women, between men – and that’s what I’ll remember.”

For Westaway, who also served as a graduate assistant coach with the Gryphon cross country and track teams during the 2018-19 season, the ultimate goal is to represent Canada at the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo. The record-setting runner will not have to wait long to get a taste of what it is like to wear her country’s colours, as she will represent Team Canada while competing in the 800m in Naples, Italy at the 2019 FISU Summer Universiade. She will be surrounded by some familiar faces in Italy, with Gryphon track and field head coach Dave Scott-Thomas serving as Team Canada’s head endurance coach. The opportunity to work with Scott-Thomas, as well as countless other key contributors within the Guelph track community, is what helped convince Jenna to make the move from Alberta to Ontario.

According to Westaway, it is a move that has paid off far beyond just the athletics component. “There were so many reasons to make the move to Guelph. Beyond excellent coaching and training program, all of the sciences are very well taken care of, with collaboration from physiologists and biomechanics specialists. We have the best sprint coach, we have Dave (Scott-Thomas), we have Scott (MacDonald), our team manager who has been an Olympic team manager. We have state-of-the-art facilities. And while I have certainly benefitted from all of that, at the end of the day, the biggest takeaway for me was just the people. The people I was working with. Just feeling the connection with the community and other runners. To see some of my teammates break through. To be able to share a hug at the end of a race. That stuff just adds up. By the end of the season I looked back and was happily overwhelmed by all of it. It was the most meaningful year to me.”