by Dan Sheldon, staff writer

Sometimes pumping iron is not enough.

Sometimes taking care of your body as an athlete goes further than some Band-Aids and  ice. For one student, a different kind of problem arose that not too many people are familiar with.

Terese Warden, junior, has struggled with low iron this season. It even forced her to sit out two weeks of practices and races this season for the cross country team.

“I was tired all the time, and when I would run faster, I would get light headed really easily. My coaches recommended that our whole team get their iron checked, and it just so happened that mine was low,” Warden said.

Warden was diagnosed with anemia. There are 400 different types of anemia, and one of them is caused by low iron. Anemia, as described by Webmd.com, is the lack of red blood cells which carry oxygen to the cells.

“Iron is a building block of red blood cells, and if we don’t have enough, we don’t build red blood cells,” said Ms. Bobbi Pointer, nurse.

Low iron is a very common form of anemia and is seen more in girls.

“It is not uncommon in high school girls. At the blood drive several students were turned away because their low measure of hemoglobin. They were all women,” Pointer said.

Low iron is a problem even at higher level competition. In a study done by the University of Minnesota in 2008, 89 percent of the women on the Gophers cross country team were anemic at one time or another.

In Warden’s case, the coaches knew that someone was wrong when she was not running like she had in the past.

“We noticed she was really sluggish. She wasn’t hitting the times she was supposed to be hitting in workouts, because she’s run with us the past couple years we know what group she should be running in. Her races weren’t at the level that we expected her to be. That’s usually our first default as coaches to say, ‘go get your iron checked,’” said Ms. Ann Sateren, head girls coach and Social Studies.

Warden had to sit out two weeks and had to do another week of training before she could run again. She also upped her iron intake and takes iron pills two times a day.

“It got me motivated to run again. My iron is up to a healthy level after about two weeks and I have a lot more energy now and can go a lot longer and a lot faster,” Warden said.

Warden, being in the top five runners for girls cross country, is a scoring athlete and with her return has caused a big boost for the team.

“She looks like a million bucks now. Her whole demeanor is much happier because she’s feeling much better and she’s staying with her workout group and having great races. She’s made a huge impact,” Sateren said.