The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
Texas paying tribute to Longhorn Legend Sanya Richard-Ross' Track & Field legacy
03.21.2022 | Texas Relays, Track & Field / Cross Country
By Emily Schumacher, Texas Athletics Communications
Longhorn Legend and Texas Athletics Hall of Honor member Sanya Richards-Ross predicted her Olympic Gold at age nine. When a primary school teacher asked the class what they wanted to be when they grew up, Richards-Ross wrote, "an Olympic champion."
Ten years later, after a UT career that included five national titles and 11 All-American honors, the class assignment materialized. At the 2004 Athens Games, Richards-Ross won her first Olympic Gold as a member of Team USA's 4x400m relay squad. Her childhood dream realized, she went on to compete in two more Olympic Games, winning a total of five medals, including four Gold and one Bronze. She is the only former Texas Track and Field star to win more than one gold medal in a single Olympics (2012), and is one of only four former Longhorns, male or female, to win individual Olympic gold. In addition to her Olympic success, Richards-Ross also was a seven-time medalist at the World Championships, five of which were gold.
In 2005 at the age of 20, the three-time Olympian became the youngest woman ever to run a sub-49 second quarter-mile with her time of 48.92 in Zurich, Switzerland. One year later at age 21, Richards-Ross set the American record in the 400m with her time of 48.70 at the IAAF World Cup in Athens, a record that still stands today. Following the 2012 London Olympics, where she won individual Gold in the 400m and another Gold Medal as the anchor of Team USA's victorious 4x400m relay, she became the second-most decorated female track and field Olympian in U.S. history.
Born in Kingston, Jamaica, Richards-Ross and her family moved to Florida when she was 12-years-old in hopes of her receiving an athletic scholarship.
The runner recalls the emotions of moving to a different country at a young age, remembering the time as traumatic. She missed her life in Jamaica.
Richards-Ross found sanctuary through running. She signed up for the track team and found a community of like-minded people.
The ginormous school system suddenly felt much smaller. She started to step into the confidence that she holds today.
"[Moving to] this big world of the United States and having a thick accent, what made me feel the most comfortable and confident was the minute I started running," Richards-Ross said. "Sports gave me tremendous confidence, as well as teaching me a lot of life lessons."
During her prep career at St. Thomas Aquinas High School in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Richards-Ross was the Gatorade National High School Girls Track & Field Athlete of the Year and a two-time Florida High School Female Athlete of the Year. She also set the nation's high school girls record and American Junior Record in the 400m (50.69), a mark she established in winning the USA Junior national title in 2002 and still holds. As one of the nation's premier prospects, she took her talents to The University of Texas in fall of 2002.
The moment Richards-Ross stepped foot on the 40 Acres she knew it was the school for her. On her first visit, she met two Jamaican women involved with Texas Athletics. The University instantly felt like home.
The running star that would go on to be twice named IAAF World Athlete of the Year (2006, 2009) and become a two-time Jesse Owens Award winner (2006, 2009), remembers the UT gym walls inscribed with the quote "the pride and the winning tradition of The University of Texas will not be entrusted to the weak or the timid."
With Richards-Ross, it wasn't.
Texas means everything to her. The track program taught her how to successfully structure her life. She learned how to participate as a team player in a highly individual sport. The staff spent a considerable amount of time mentoring her. She would win individual titles in the 400m at the 2003 NCAA Outdoor and 2004 NCAA Indoor Championships and also anchor three 4x400m relay national-title-winning squads. She won eight individual Big 12 titles to go along with five league relay victories, and was named the 2003 Track & Field News Female Collegiate Athlete of the Year. Her indoor (50.82) and outdoor (49.89) school records stood for a dozen years before Courtney Okolo broke them in 2016.
Richards-Ross also met her husband, football All-American Aaron Ross, the 2006 Thorpe Award winner and key member of the 2005 National Championship team, through Texas Athletics. Their son, Aaron Ross II, already knows the "Hook 'em Horns" hand sign.
"The relationships I built at UT and the discipline and structure that I learned helped me to be the woman I am today," Richards-Ross said.
She hopes to leave a Texas legacy of pushing to be greater. The runner is a product of hard work and her career is proof of that.
This week, Richards-Ross will participate in the Clyde Littlefield Texas Relays presented by Truist as the Honorary Referee, a prestigious role reserved for the legends of that event and Texas. The 2016 inductee into the Texas Track and Field Coaches Association Hall of Fame recalls fond memories of breaking NCAA outdoor records at Texas Relays with her teammates.
Texas Relays just so happens to fall during Women's History Month. A month equally important to Texas Athletics and Richards-Ross.
The Olympian and member of the Texas Sports Hall of Fame (class of 2014) takes this month to celebrate those who paved the way for her and the future generations of strong women. She hopes that commending female success will inspire young girls to push the envelope on what is possible.
"I don't take for granted the shoulders that I stand on, [of] the women who fought for us to compete at the highest level," said Richards-Ross. "We go from black history month to women's history month and I love that we get to celebrate the achievements of women all over the world."
Growing up, Richards-Ross admired runners Merlene Ottey and Jackie Joyner-Kersee. These two athletes mirrored something she wanted to be in the future. They had tenacity.
Years later, she is now a role model for the next generation of athletes, expanding the boundaries of what is possible. Young girls see themselves in her.
"I know how important it is, especially for young black girls, to see themselves in different spaces," Richards-Ross said. "Whether it's sports, politics, television or magazines. I take that very seriously and try to be the best role model I can be."
The mentor connects with her audience through social media and her written work.
In 2017, Richards-Ross released her first children's book, Run with Me: The Story of a U.S Olympic Champion. The book was published with intentions of helping adolescents set and achieve goals.
Each chapter challenges the reader to use what they read in their own lives. The author wants others to learn from her own trials. She believes that mentorship is allowing her own past to aid in others having better experiences.
Richards-Ross, the 2005 Visa Champion and Humanitarian Athlete of the Year who was inducted into the Texas Athletics Hall of Honor in 2011, can't imagine her life without sports. She can't picture where she would be without The University of Texas. Most of all, she can't think of where sports would be without the female athletes who fought before her. Thanks to them, Sanya Richards-Ross is a National Champion, a World Champion, and the Olympic Champion she always dreamed of becoming.
This Saturday on the Mike A. Myers Stadium track where she starred for the Longhorns and competed as a collegian and pro at the Clyde Littlefield Texas Relays, The University of Texas will celebrate its Longhorn Legend.
