Fast fashionista: A local track star’s story from resilience to brilliance
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- Madonna Hanna transformed late-life adversity into national sprinting success.
- Since 2011, Hanna earned over 20 medals and set a state record at age 71.
- Hanna balances fashion, education and athletics with resilience and purpose.
The voice in Madonna Hanna’s head first arrived in 2011 at the age of 57, an overwhelming desire she couldn’t shake: “Run 100 meters.”
For days, it was unwavering. “Run 100 meters,” the voice told her time and time again. “Run 100 meters.”
Hanna, a longtime fashion executive and educator, replied to herself: “Hey, I’m planning a spring fashion show.”
The voice refused an excuse: “Run 100 meters.”
“The heck’s this coming from? I have no track experience whatsoever,” Hanna recalled on a sunny Tuesday morning at North Tacoma’s Truman Middle School. “Sometimes, something comes over you, and it just won’t let you go.”
Madonna’s husband, Steven, a retired high school track coach, agreed to revive the role for his wife. In no time, Hanna was running with ankle weights and a backpack full of bricks, making routine trips from their Ruston home on North 49th Street to the waterfront or through Point Defiance to Owen Beach.
“He was real old-school,” Hanna smiled.
Fourteen years later, the “Fast Fashionista” will compete in her fifth National Senior Games this month in Des Moines, Iowa, from July 24 to Aug. 4. Hanna, 71, is a 2023 National Senior Games gold medalist (4x100M Relay), 10-time Washington State Senior Games gold medalist and state-record holder for the Women’s 70-74 50M Dash (8.83).
Rarely is adversity met with such grace. In 2014, Hanna suffered a severe Achilles tear that threatened her track career. In Nov. 2018, she lost Steven to cancer, who insisted that Madonna keep racing — one of his final requests.
“I just wanted to (complete) the goal that my husband and I had,” Hanna said.
FASHIONISTA FIRST
Born in September 1953, Hanna was raised in a Boston suburb and quickly found a calling for fashion. By age 5, she was rearranging the clothes in her parents’ closet and carefully inspecting each garment one by one.
Every Sunday, The Boston Globe contained paper dolls with coloring instructions: “Color the top yellow and the pants green,” it directed, but Hanna wouldn’t oblige — often incorporating her own flair and designing new clothes for the doll when necessary.
“I would sell merchandise to my toys,” Hanna said. “I’d line them up, and I was presenting merchandise and giving them the benefits and features. But I didn’t know it was what I would do later in life. I was doing what came naturally.”
On special occasions, Hanna’s mother took her to downtown Boston for trips to the department store. But young Madonna wasn’t shopping; she was evaluating. “I like this. I don’t like this. Why is that a certain color?”
The passion never left. A successful student, Hanna would attend the Chamberlain School of Retailing in Boston, a private vocational school specializing in fashion. She later joined Jordan Marsh’s executive training program, becoming one of few African-American managers and overcoming “too many horror stories” of discrimination from select customers and executives.
“Sometimes, when adverse things happen to you, I can now say thank goodness I was bullied,” Hanna told The News Tribune. “What I went through … I had already built up that thick skin from elementary and high school. I’ve already heard those words before. Been there, done that.
“When you go through adversity, you’ve got something to lean back on.”
Hanna excelled at Jordan Marsh before working for a national women’s apparel manufacturer in its design and merchandising department, a “blast” that revealed the other side of the fashion world. She’d meet Steven at a Boston tennis club, an educator whose career brought the pair to The Evergreen State.
Another epiphany struck in 1980: Utilizing her experience and love for fashion and marketing, Hanna could teach. She joined Bremerton School District’s Kitsap Peninsula Vocational Skills Center, now known as West Sound Tech, that year.
“I knew not everybody would go into the fashion industry, but I wanted to instill a good work ethic, human relation skills, salesmanship, customer service and developing good character,” Hanna said. “I would have written on my whiteboard: ‘Civility counts.’ And I told my students that there will be no bullying here.”
STILL STANDING
In January 1987, Hanna was a carpooling passenger in a coworker’s El Camino destined for Bremerton when time stopped. Traveling upwards of 80 miles per hour, the vehicle struck a stationary semi-truck, crushed underneath its rear axle. Hanna’s coworker died at the scene.
“There was nothing left of that vehicle,” Hanna said Tuesday, recalling her five years of physical therapy with accident-related injuries to her neck, back and hips. Though the wreck ended her career at Kitsap Vocational, Hanna would build a fashion program for Bates Technical College that fall. She returned to Bremerton School District in 1996 and retired from Bremerton High in 2012.
“To be sprinting and doing what I’m doing right now … to have survived that and gone through the most excruciating pain that I’ve ever (experienced) in my life? When people say they got up on the wrong side of the bed today, my attitude is: ‘Any time you can get up on any side of the bed, it’s a good day,’” Hanna said.
STATE HISTORY IN THE MAKING
Months after her first brick-filled backpacking journeys to the Ruston waterfront, Steven entered his wife in the 2011 Washington State Senior Games. A contestant in the Women’s 55-59 50M and 100M Dashes, Hanna was “there on a whim” — side-by-side with the state’s fastest and most experienced runners.
“All I have to do is run fast in a straight line,” a seemingly-naive Hanna told herself, at least until the starting gun fired. The 56-year-old from Tacoma dashed across the finish line in 8.91 seconds, capturing the gold medal in the biggest race of her life.
Hanna later swept her events with a gold medal in the 100M Dash (17.25), and competitors flooded her with questions: “What club do you run for? Who do you run with? You could go to nationals!”
“And I’m thinking … me? I’ve done this with my students (and told them) you can do this, you can do that,” Hanna said. “They could see something that I couldn’t see. So I tried again (in 2012).
“And darned if I didn’t qualify for the 2013 National Senior Games.”
The “Fast Fashionista” continues to blaze her own trail in nationwide competition 14 years since her first race, set to compete in her fifth National Senior Games in Des Moines, Iowa, this month. Captivated by Olympic sprinters at a young age, Hanna spent afternoons in the yard imagining a gold medal around her neck. Now, she has one — albeit in a later chapter.
“When people think of longevity and aging … I’m not quite what you think,” she said.
Soon enough, there was another hurdle to clear. In contention for another medal at the 2014 Washington State Senior Games, Hanna was feet from the 50M Dash finish line when she heard what she thought was another starting gun.
A snap heard by competitors and spectators alike, Hanna had ruptured her left Achilles. Doctors at Tacoma General Hospital told her she might never run competitively again.
She never believed them.
“Once you go through the pain, the swelling, the surgery, the rehab, I had absolutely no lift in my left leg,” Hanna said. “But I thought to myself: You were in worse pain in the car accident.
“This is nothing compared to what you went through.”
For two years, Hanna was relentless. She’d walk (and eventually jog) laps, adding distance weekly. Now, she’s even faster.
Hanna’s remarkable comeback began with a pair of gold medals in the 50M (9.81) and 100M (17.93) dashes at the 2017 Washington State Senior Games. Last summer, she set a new state record in the Women’s 70-74 50M Dash (8.83), edging a previous mark of 8.84 seconds that stood for 15 years.
Now coached by Marcus Chambers, a Foss High alum and 2015 Pac-12 400M champion with the Oregon Ducks, Hanna departs for Iowa this month in contention for national medals in the 50M and 100M Dashes. “Daring to defy” the inevitability of aging, she’ll carry the Washington state flag at the National Senior Games’ Celebration of Athletes, something she considers the honor of a lifetime.
Hanna is sponsored by GetSetUp, a digital wellness platform offering free fitness and mental health classes to local seniors through the Washington State Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS).
“You’re not alone,” Hanna said. “You can still learn and be part of a vibrant community of people your own age.”
DECORATED BEYOND HER YEARS
Hanna arrived at Tacoma’s Truman Middle School on Tuesday morning with a duffel bag containing her track spikes, warm-up equipment, and a collection of state and national medals at The News Tribune’s request. Hanna’s accolades on the track include:
2011 Washington State Senior Games
50M Dash — Gold (8.91, personal best)
100M Dash — Gold (17.25)
2012 Washington State Senior Games
100M Dash — Silver (17.14)
200M Dash — Bronze (36.12)
2013 National Senior Games
100M Dash — 9th (16.82)
200M Dash — 11th (38.16)
4x100M Relay — Bronze (1:01.00)
2014 Washington State Senior Games
50M Dash — Silver (9.54)
2017 Washington State Senior Games
50M Dash — Gold (9.81)
100M Dash — Gold (17.93)
2018 Washington State Senior Games
50M Dash — Silver (9.78)
100M Dash — Bronze (18.95)
2019 National Senior Games
50M Dash — 16th (9.32)
100M Dash — 17th (18.60)
2019 Washington State Senior Games
50M Dash — Silver (9.67)
100M Dash — Silver (18.72)
2021 Washington State Senior Games
50M Dash — Gold (9.03)
100M Dash — Gold (17.54)
2022 National Senior Games
50M Dash — 10th (8.98)
100M Dash — 7th (16.62, personal best)
4x100M Relay — Silver (1:11.13)
2022 Washington State Senior Games
50M Dash — Gold (9.14)
100M Dash — Gold (18.31)
2023 National Senior Games
50M Dash — 5th (8.81, personal best)
100M Dash — 5th (17.25)
4x100M Relay — Gold (1:17.00)
2024 Washington State Senior Games
50M Dash — Gold (8.83, new state record)
100M Dash — Gold (17.19)
This story was originally published July 13, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
