NATHANIEL MATA | STAFF WRITER
McALLEN — McAllen High senior Alanah Moreno has been swimming since third grade, but her decision to try out for cross country and track during her final year of high school paid off. She signed a national letter of intent Wednesday to run at The University of Texas at Arlington with her tuition and books paid.
She started running a couple summers ago to stay in shape during the swimming offseason. Her neighbor and McHi track coach Luis Cantu noticed her running around the block and tried to get her to come out for track.
In June, she finally built up the nerve to go to an early cross country practice. She said on the way to practice she tried to get her mom to turn the car around because she was afraid she wouldn’t be able to keep up. Instead, she set the pace.
“It was so instant, and it was so different than swimming, because I was on my feet a lot of the time, but the transition was all new to me,” Moreno said. “The training is different.
The competition is different. I actually get more tired than I do with swimming. It was a really cool experience.”
She seemed happy to face the challenge of adding another strenuous, endurance-focused sport to her schedule.
“I’m very big on nutrition. That’s what I’m studying in college, so that was a big part,” Moreno said. “I knew I was going to have to eat a lot to manage. Some days, I would have to get up extra early to run two miles and then go to the weight room for swimming, then swim after school. It was a lot, but my food was important. My sleep was important. My grades were very important.”
Moreno’s mother, Melissa Mendoza, said her daughter’s talent lifting a big financial burden was great for the small family.
“I’m a single mom. I’ve raised her all my life, and a year ago I was sitting thinking, ‘I need to send her to college. How am I going to do this?’” Mendoza said. “Just all of a sudden, this opportunity came up, and she did that on her own, and I couldn’t be prouder. This is an amazing feeling.”
Moreno had only been running for a few months when she met with UT-Arlington’s coach at the RGVCCCA Meet of Champions, where he was already scouting other Valley athletes. She’ll join Sharyland High’s Valeria Diaz and Mercedes’s Dominic Cavazos as RGV runners turned UT-Arlington Mavericks.
In her first cross country season, Moreno placed fourth in the District 30-6A meet and 19th at regionals — just one spot away from a trip to state.
“She did it all on her own,” Mendoza said. “She didn’t do anything else but work out and work at it. She was really determined and did great.
Veteran McHi track coach Robert Martinez said Moreno has the personality that makes hard work seem easy. With her background in endurance workouts and light running, the coaches just had to turn up the pace.
“She’s always running on her own,” Martinez said. “It was not a bad transition for her. It was just more intensity that was applied to her workouts. She still has a lot of mileage. Her best will be in college. She’s not run down, like some athletes who are run down and they get to college and they’re all spent.”