University of Montana Senior Completes Transition And Returns To What She Loves: Running

By Mary Albl of DyeStat

When Juniper Eastwood went to the starting line of a small rust-buster meet Aug. 31 in Cheney, Wash., it felt to her like any other race. 

But it wasn’t. 

The build-up included a rollercoaster of emotions. Anxiety. Excitedness. Relief. After more than a year of not competing, she was finally going to race.

The senior at the University of Montana became the first openly transgender athlete to compete in an NCAA Division I cross country race. 

“When I woke up I was anxious, and all the way into the beginning of the race, I was still pretty anxious,” Eastwood said. “But at the same time, I was really excited and really happy because I was able to race again.”

Eastwood, born male, identifies as a female. She ran for the University of Montana’s men’s cross country and track teams for three years in Missoula as Jonathan Eastwood.

At the end of the spring season in 2018, Eastwood began to transition. She sat out a total of 15 months and complied with the NCAA policy that requires a transgender athlete who has transitioned from male to female to take testosterone-suppression medication for a full year before competing again.

Eastwood’s daily routine includes taking testosterone-suppression and estrogen pills twice a day. 

At the Clash of the Inland Northwest, Eastwood covered 4 kilometers in 14 minutes, 33 seconds to finish in seventh place. Her last race for the men’s track team, she also finished in seventh place.

Eastwood laughed when the coincidence was mentioned. She hadn’t given it any thought. She’s just happy to have the first race of the season over with.  

She harbored some fear of a negative reaction to her racing. In the weeks leading up to the race, articles were written. The chatter on social media was a predictable mix of negative and positive. But Eastwood pushed it aside and ran uninterrupted. 

“It just felt like any other race,” Eastwood said. “It was really nice that’s how it ended up.” 

Eastwood’s teammate, freshman Beatrix Frissell, won the race in 14:13.7. The Grizzlies finished second as a team. 

“I’m sure for June it was a relief to finally get out there and get back (competing), and I think it allows her to move forward,” University of Montana’s track and field head coach Brian Schweyen said. “I think people are expecting her to be this guy out there running, and she’s not the best runner on the women’s team, yet she was on the male team. Obviously, again, perceptions aren’t being backed with enough knowledge.”

GETTING TO KNOW “JUNE”

“A lot of my friends would say I’m like a 22-year-old soccer mom,” Eastwood said. 

Any self-description invariably comes back to a love of running. It’s an activity that takes her into Montana’s quiet, boundless landscapes. And it’s part of her identity, too.  

“I would probably call myself a runner first and foremost, that being one of the most important things to me,” she says. “Secondly, I would call myself an outdoors enthusiast.”

Growing up in Belgrade, Mont., about 10 miles northwest of Bozeman, the mountains, forests and fresh air provided an outlet for Eastwood to explore her passion for running.  

“I think that aspect of it is why I really enjoyed running, because the places I get to run are really beautiful, and I don’t necessarily focus on just the running aspect of it,” she said. 

Eastwood first got involved in running in elementary school. She pinpoints field day as a vivid memory. It was something she found immediate success in, and also something that made her feel good. At Belgrade High, Eastwood was a middle-distance standout, winning the Montana State Class A boys titles in the 800 meters (1:53.17), 1,600 (4:21.01) and 3,200 (9:48.56) as a senior.

“(June) was known on campus as an athlete, as a runner,” Belgrade art teacher Frank Jacques said. “She drove a white pickup truck with running stickers on it, ate crappy McDonald’s food, and graduated, I believe, in the Top 10 of her class.” 

In the summer of 2013 Eastwood met Jacques, who moved from Washington to Montana to teach at Belgrade, and became an assistant coach for cross country. Fellow Belgrade teacher Joe Terrazas frequently joined them for runs, a habit that continued when June went to college. The long runs spurred conversations that went beyond the miles.

“Enormously, we talked about training, runners, results, suffering, shoes,” Jacques said. “Those conversations in typical fashion would loop around to school, politics, ethics, the crappy food June was eating, other stuff. June never brought up big concerns on runs but we may have addressed personal stuff in an oblique way.”

And yet, the coach and confidant didn’t know Eastwood’s inner-most battles. 

“Neither Joe nor I knew that June was wrestling with identity,” Jacques said. “Ever.”

Eastwood said it was in middle school, about 11 or 12 years old, right around the time when puberty hit, when miserable and confusing feelings began to take hold. Without anyone to talk to, she went online, learned what it means to be transgender and watched a YouTuber who talked about things that struck a chord. 

“We know that in trans youth, the incidence of anxiety and depression are significantly increased as compared to cis-gender youth,” said Susan D. Boulware, M.D., Pediatric Endocrinology, Medical Director of the Yale Gender Program in an earlier DyeStat article on transgender youth.  

Eastwood’s family members were not the first people she talked to. Instead, it was a close friend. She told her mom her sophomore year of high school. Jacques found out at an indoor collegiate meet in 2018 at Montana State, when Eastwood told him of her plans to transition. Jacques had heard through the grapevine that something was going on, so he was somewhat prepared.   

“Although I wasn't sure it was going to be her transgender admission, that had crossed my mind,” he said. “Honestly, I was just really touched that she wanted to share with me. It takes some courage to own your stuff and to say it to the world must be massive and scary. And I’m not scary,” Jacques said with a laugh. “Running was the thing that brought us together. Running was the platform to learn about each other. I was there to remind her to see the big picture.”

A RUNNER

It was the end of May 2018 when Eastwood officially started to transition from a male to female.

For the first four to five months of the process, there was an energy drain, but it was something she expected.

During the transition, Eastwood reached out to Joanna Harper, a scientist, runner and transgender female. Harper, who ran collegiately in Canada, now works as a medical physicist, and is a consultant on Gender Issues for the International Olympic Committee. She has published works regarding the discovery and in-depth analysis of how gender transitions alter athletic performance. The two had multiple discussions about the process and the changes Eastwood would expect to experience, among a range of other topics. 

Harper, who grew up as a male, began hormone therapy in August 2004. She said within nine months she was running 12 percent slower. 

“Apples to apples comparison, in distance events especially, you should expect to see a 10-12 percent decrease,” Harper said. 

Eastwood said she is putting in the same effort as before during training and on runs, but is just slower. The harder part to deal with was the realization that she would not be allowed to compete for the first time since sixth grade. 

“Even beforehand I was like, ‘Wow, this is going to be a really long time off of competing,’” she said. “But at the same time, I was excited to take a step back and focus on more important things like making sure I’m emotionally well.”

From May 2018 to this past summer, the timeline allowed Eastwood to learn more about herself, and hone in on her love of running. She said she grew to understand completely that the transition was absolutely the right decision for her. 

“I was really miserable for quite a few years,” she said. “And learning how to be self-assured and self-confident was definitely a valuable lesson the last year.”

Eastwood wasn’t sure whether she would run on a team again. The fear of carrying the label transgender, as an athlete, felt daunting. Eastwood forged ahead, not to make history, but to keep doing what she loves while being at ease, for the first time, with who she is.

“When you’re a runner, the idea of not being one is also a scary thought,” Jacques said. “To me, that’s the most interesting part. She had an opportunity to not compete. And that would have been really easy and it would have been truthful because she would have been owning the transition part of it, but an enormous part of her identity is running. And so the question is, ‘Really, do you run or do you not run?’ And anybody who’s a runner goes, ‘You have to run.’ That’s really who she is. She’s a runner.”

NEXT STEPS

Eastwood will graduate from the University of Montana next spring with her second degree in philosophy. She jokes how she’ll never get a job with that degree. 

“We joke in the department how it’s one of those degrees that makes you want to not have a job,” she said. 

She’s not sure of her plans come post-grad life. 

“I’ll probably find some outdoor store to work at and just spend my time outside,” she said.

Before that, though, she has the remainder of the cross country season and indoor and outdoor track. Her next cross country race is Sept. 21 at the Montana State Invitational in Bozeman, close to home. 

“June just loves competing and running,” Schweyen said. “There’s no set standard on where she should be because there’s not enough studies, but it’s pretty clear she is nowhere near where Jonathan was.”

Harper doesn’t believe transgender women who are competing with female hormone levels will sound the death knell of women’s sports. But with a vague NCAA Policy, Harper does think there should be some enforcement of the rules in place. 

“One of the things that I have seen, with subjects of mine, one in particular, who went off hormones, within a week, her male-like performance had returned,” Harper said. “And she was still competing in the men's division at the time, she wasn't in the NCAA. The fact is, if a trans women chose to go off her hormone therapy, it would not take very long for her performance to increase.”  

Harper stated that a vast majority of transwomen will gladly accept a hormone level within female norms because it makes them feel better.

“We are happier, healthier and less suicidal,” she said.

While Eastwood favors track over cross country, she’s embracing her final season on the trails. Her goals are not individual, but rather team-oriented. That’s one thing she learned about herself during the process: how to be a better teammate.

“Beforehand it was sort of (about) me. I only cared about the individual result,” Eastwood said. “At the end of the day, I was out for myself. But now it’s a lot more important to me to how the team finishes. It’s awesome that I get to be part of the team for one last year. I’m so excited for the opportunity.” 

Jacques said he’s not surprised Eastwood is the person who is blazing this new path. A pioneer, of sorts. 

“The big picture is, it could be important for the rest of us because we’re going to see how this all plays out,” Jacques said of Eastwood’s final season. “What the response is. Is the NCAA criteria useful? We’re all going to watch and see how this plays out, and be happy with it or make adjustments afterwards. And she’s willing to be the first.”

# # #

* Estrogen: According to medicinenet.com, “A female steroid hormone that is produced by the ovaries and, in lesser amounts, by the adrenal cortex, placenta, and male testes.” Estrogen induces secondary sexual characteristics including breast development (and if the individual has a uterus, estrogen will stimulate growth of the lining of the uterus and eventually will lead to periods).

* Testosterone: A sex hormone produced by the testes as well as lesser amounts from the adrenal glands and ovaries. Testosterone stimulates development of male secondary sexual characteristics including enlargement of the penis, deepening of the voice, an increase in body hair and development of facial hair. Testosterone increases muscle mass as well as bone mass.

* NCAA Policy: https://www.ncaa.org/sites/default/files/NCLR_TransStudentAthlete%2B(2).pdf