Assistant track and field coach Brittany Aanstad has established herself as one of CWU’s most decorated coaches as she heads into her 10th year as a member of the track and field coaching staff. 

“I was down in Kentucky getting my master’s,” Aanstad said. “I got a call about this job opening up. I was a track coach down there. They asked if I’d be interested, so I applied and got it.”

At CWU, Aanstad has coached 33 GNAC champions, 22 All-American athletes and led the women’s team to a GNAC Indoor Track and Field Championship in 2018. She was also voted Women’s Assistant Coach of the Year for the West Region by the U.S. Track and Field Coaches Association in 2019.

“It was the first group of athletes that I had recruited to Central and developed,” Aanstad said about the 2018 women’s team. “Getting to see them at the national level … I enjoyed that.”

Coach Aanstad said she prioritizes team success. 

“It’s always important to leave a program better than how you found it,” Aanstad said. “Central’s always been highly successful. It’s great to have our athletes litter the record boards … whether it’s a GNAC record or a conference title where their name is forever embedded into GNAC track and field.”

Aanstad said she knows all about littering the record boards. As a student athlete at Seattle Pacific University, she made All-American for women’s javelin three times and won the national championship for the event in her senior year. 

“When I was an athlete, any success was really a product of my environment,” Aanstad said. “It was important to be in a place that allowed me to grow both as an athlete and an individual.” 

Aanstad enjoys the challenge of transitioning from player to coach. 

“As a coach, it’s a little different because you are trying to create that environment,” Aanstad said. “You’re trying to create that culture. It’s a bit more pressure than you would originally think. But when you create that, you get enough of the right athletes with the passion to be a bright light for others and it comes together.”

Aanstad said she finds being able to see the culture she’s been trying to build come together rewarding. 

“It’s extremely rewarding to be able to see an 18-year-old grow into a 22 or 23-year-old,” Aanstad said. “You get to see who they become and how they have a part of Central track and field forever with them.”  

As she looks on toward her future at CWU, Aanstad’s goals stay focused on her student-athletes and not herself. 

“My biggest goal is that any athlete that I ever have … come out of Central with a degree,” Aanstad said. “The second goal is that they are a very desirable employee, and that employers desire them because they come from Central track and field … I want to see them make an impact on society.”