Aaliyah Brown – Illinois’ Rising Star on Track

“I feel really good about my race. I came here to win.  I felt my start was good, my transition phases throughout  the race was good, so I feel really good about my race,” said 17 year-old Aaliyah Brown commenting on  her performance at the Adidas Grand Prix last weekend in New York.  The Illinois native ran a personal best of 11.44 seconds in the 100m to take 2nd place behind winner Shayla Sanders (11.34) in the Adidas Girls’ Dream 100. Aaliyah will now focus her  attention on the USA Junior Trial that  is scheduled for  Indianapolis  this weekend (June 15-17). Support from Illinois Elite Track Team Aaliyah is a member of the Illinois Elite Track Club where she is coached by her father Angelo Brown, who is the head coach with the club. “I feel like my track team and my father prepared me to do really well. We have some of the best runners on our track team in Illinois and I feel that they push me every day in practice. I push myself number one and I always give 100% effort in everything I do.” she said. Aaliyah will continue to focus on the 100m although she indicated that she would have liked to compete in the 200m. However, an injury that she sustained last year has so far kept her from doing so. She pointed out that she will pursue the 200m next season. College  Aaliyah who has a GPA of 3.5 and is just completing her junior year in high school, has her sights set on college, and  has not yet made her college choice  since colleges are not allowed to speak to her until July 1.  However, she lists her three  top choices as Texas A&M, UCLA and Oregon. Should Aaliyah make the USA team in Indianapolis this weekend, her next stop would be to compete for the USA at the World Junior Championship in Barcelona later this summer.