By Jeff Metcalfe
Perhaps the name is familiar, but maybe not, even for the most avid Arizona State fan.
Triathlon still is awaiting full NCAA championship certification and is not the most spectator-friendly sport unless it comes to watching the Women’s Collegiate National Championship, held seven times in Tempe since 2017.
That’s where you may have seen Henry or remember her from. She was the national champion in 2017 and 2018 and runner-up in 2021. No one else has won two titles in triathlon’s NCAA emerging sport era that began in 2014, when ASU was at the forefront of elevating it to a varsity sport.
Making Henry’s death on Feb. 8 after being struck while cycling by a hit-and-run driver all the more tragic because of what the 26-year-old accomplished in her sport and beyond.
“Hannah moved that bar for all of us,” ASU triathlon coach Cliff English says. “We had a very strong recruiting class (in 2017), and she took it to another level. She did so much for us as a team, but also for the sport.
“Sometimes you need to have those people who are game changers who drive it forward, and people chase. The level we are at now in NCAA triathlon is because of her.”
The pain of Henry being killed while cycling, part of what brought her to Arizona, is unrelenting for those who knew her. It’s a 15-year flashback to 2011 for English of marathoner/triathlete Sally Meyerhoff’s death at 27 in a cycling accident outside Maricopa. Meyerhoff came to some of English’s triathlon camps when he was living in Tucson.
The way forward for English, and others who knew Henry, is to “focus on the brightness she brought.”
Beyond her quiet demeanor
Audrey Ernst joined the ASU triathlon team in 2018 when Henry was a sophomore and defending national champion. She grew up in Illinois and Henry in Canada.
They connected so well that “Hannah became my closest confidante,” Ernst says. “This friendship kind of blossomed from this teammate experience.”
There was another side to the quiet, humble Henry who deflected credit to others.
She loved Taylor Swift, pink sparkles and dancing. “She showed me how much fun life was,” Ernst says. “And how to fall in love with the context of the sport. She was always the (trip) planner. We’d go to San Diego and open water swim and run along the beach. That’s what created this foundation of this active lifestyle I still love.”
Charlotte Ahrens, from Germany, started a year ahead of Henry at ASU and was national runner-up to her in 2017 and 2018. In a Facebook post with joyful photos together, Ahrens chose the perfect musical backing, Swift’s 2010 “Long Live,” with these lyrics:
On a history book page
It was the end of a decade
But the start of an age
Long live the walls we crashed through
All the kingdom lights shined just for me and you
I was screaming long live all the magic we made
Ahrens touchingly wrote, “Having the chance to live life with you, getting to know you as a young, shy girl and seeing you grow into a young, self-confident, beautiful woman, I will always be thankful for. I got to call you my teammate, my sustainability and cow-loving buddy, my friend, my little sister in heart who always made the world a little brighter.
“What, a colorful footprint you have left on this earth, small enough to always give space to your friends and family, big enough to follow in with honor.”
Henry excelled in academics, graduating summa cum laude in 2021, then going on to complete a master’s degree in global management in 2023. She was working as a sustainability project manager for the American Composites Manufacturers Association.
“Sustainability is a buzzword, but do we live it?” Ernst says. “Hannah lived it. She was using reusable ziplock baggies from freshman year. She would compost. She switched to being a vegan and a vegetarian because she cared so much about the sustainability aspect of your diet.
“I thought that was so remarkable. To see someone who is working in an industry they also really believe in and they’re living that was as well. She accomplished so much at such a young age and set such a high bar for so many people.”
Jeff Metcalfe was a professional newspaper reporter for 46 years, primarily in Phoenix covering Arizona State sports since 1985. He has covered 15 Olympics and was 2021 Arizona Sportswriter of the Year named by the National Sports Media Association.
