Yasmin Deane was a student at Lafayette Elementary School in Fredericksburg when her mother first noticed she had a combination of speed and competitiveness.
Deane consistently finished as runner-up to the same girl in the school’s fun run, but she was determined to eventually overcome her classmate.
“Toward the end, she was able to beat her,” Jaime Deane-Byrd recalled. “Then, she went to Walker-Grant and broke some records there at that school and went to [James Monroe High School] and won four or five [state championship relay] rings.”
Deane’s upward trajectory came to a sudden halt, however, during her senior indoor track and field season at JM. She began complaining of stomachaches and headaches and dropped from 130 pounds to 90.
She was diagnosed with severe ulcerative colitis, a chronic inflammatory bowel disease that causes inflammation and ulcers in the large intestine and rectum.
After three years, three colonoscopies and multiple changes to medication, Deane is back on track.
While a sophomore at the University of Mary Washington in the classroom, she’s classed as a freshman on the women’s track and field team. She’s a nationally ranked sprinter for the Eagles, who will compete in the Coast 2 Coast Conference track and field championships Friday and Saturday at Christopher Newport University in Newport News.
“To me, it’s amazing that someone could be laying in the bed for months, can’t eat, going through pain, laying on the floor, had to see a cardiologist because her heart rate was jacked up,” Deane-Byrd said. “And that same person could kick back around and is doing so well in college now.”
Deane’s grandmother calls her “the comeback kid.” But it wasn’t an easy process.
After Deane missed her senior outdoor season at JM in 2022, then-Mary Washington interim head coach Anthony Wallace, a longtime coach and mentor for Fredericksburg area athletes, convinced her to attend UMW.
“It was super upsetting because I had some goals I wanted to reach,” Deane said of not being able to compete her senior season. “I was ready to go to college and run track, but it didn’t work out.”
Wallace pitched UMW as an attractive option because she could slowly work her way back into shape with his guidance. Also, her doctors and family would be nearby.
Wallace began working with Deane when she was in the eighth grade, so he knew her potential if she were to recover and return to form.
But Wallace, now an assistant coach at UMW, had to exercise patience. The medications Deane initially tried did not work. She then took a break from school in 2023-24 before returning last fall.
Consultations with her doctor and another in Charlottesville led to her attempting Remicade infusion therapy. Other than one flare-up in December, she’s felt good ever since.
“She was like, ‘I feel like I’ve got my weight back,’” Wallace said. “Her mom hit me up, like ‘Yasmin’s feeling good.’ So, I was like, ‘Come out on Sundays and take our time and get back in shape.’”
When Deane first attempted a return in 2022, Wallace said she could not complete a basic warmup drill of skipping along the track. But he quickly noticed this time was different.
“The first time, she got through 30 minutes of the workout. The next time she got through 40 minutes of the workout,” Wallace said. “By Week 4, I’m looking at her 30-meter time, which I always look at, and I started noticing she’s getting it back to where she was before she was sick. I immediately texted the head coach. I said, ‘Yasmin is back.’”
Deane is set to compete in the 100 meters, the 200 and the 400 relay at the conference level. Nationally, she is ranked 16th in Division III in the 100 with a season-best time of 11.87 seconds. She is ranked 20th in the 200 (24.42). She runs the anchor leg on the relay.
Deane noted that the top 20 qualify for nationals, so she’s intent on maintaining or increasing her rankings this weekend.
“My goal is to get first in all my races, and hopefully solidify my chances of going to nationals,” she said. “I’ve qualified in the 100 and the 200, but I’m trying to make sure I’m in there because the rankings always change.”
Deane typically has a cheering section of 10-15 people during competitions. Wallace encourages her family to attend every event. One reason: he does not want her riding the bus back with the team since her immune system is compromised. Her mother said that while it may take one person two or three days to get over a common cold, Deane could be sick for multiple weeks.
But despite those challenges, Deane’s joy is back.
“It feels good just being on a team after three years of being out,” she said. “It gives me a sense of pride knowing how far I’ve come and how sick I once was.”
