Prospect High School’s Brooke Wilson spent close to a month this summer at a camp in Minnesota, the same camp her father attended, which she says was founded in 1910 when “people thought boys were getting too soft. So they created this camp to give them more outdoor experiences.”
No one could accuse Wilson of being too soft.
She had an impressive running season as a sophomore, finishing 24th in the state in cross-country, and followed that up with a track season where she finished sixth overall in the IHSA 3A state championships in the 1,600 meters (4:59.78) and second in the 3,200 meters (10:51.36).
“I hadn’t decided initially to do both of those events (at the state meet),” Wilson said. “I was going to just do the 3,200, but my coach (Pete Wintermute) looked at the seed times and thought I had a good chance to medal in both, so I went for it.”
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It was actually at that summer camp, which Wilson has been attending for years, that she discovered she was pretty fast.
“I think I was 9 or 10, and they had a track meet and needed one of the younger girls to run the mile,” she said. “And I said, sure, I’ll do it. I ended up beating all of the other girls, including the 15 year olds.”
Her parents thought she might have found her sport.
“I’m the only one in my family who’s ever done running,” she said. “But when they saw how fast I was, they suggested I might want to try it out. I guess if it wasn’t for that I might be playing tennis or something else.”
This summer, before leaving for camp, she finished first at the girls’ high school division of the Magnificent Mile, a track invitational in Chicago, by running 5:03.56.
“I was hoping to break five minutes,” she said. “But I think I can get there next year.”
After taking a few weeks off from running, she’s back to focusing on the cross-country season and improving on her finish at state.
“I’m hoping to be more consistent this season,” she said. “I think that the track season helped me (gain speed), and now I just need to learn to use it in the races.
“I think having some experiences helps, too, at the state meet,” she said. “It’s an interesting course, where you run about 400 meters before the first turn. You think you’re in good shape and then everyone collapses in, and 50 people are ahead of you. And you think, how did that happen?”
She’s also hoping that the rest of her teammates will be joining her at state.
“I really think we can get the whole team there this year,” she said. “We were a very young team last year, and now that we’re getting older, I think we have a shot at it.”
Wilsonis looking forward to starting the college recruiting process this fall. She’s planning on majoring in pre-med or biology — “something with science and math.”
Banowetz is a freelance reporter.
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