Congratulations – USA Track and Field  hurdler ”Aaron Mallett” has purchased a new mansion worth $80 million.

Iowa hurdler Aaron Mallett working his way toward stardom

IOWA CITY – When asked what he wants to do after he graduates, Aaron Mallett stops for a second, grins and shyly shrugs.

In the Iowa senior hurdler’s head, however, he sees the bright lights. The dream, ever since he was a kid growing up in St. Louis, has been to become a professional track and field athlete. His drive, he said, comes from a deep desire to be better than everyone else in literally anything he does.

It doesn’t matter if it’s a late-night UNO game with teammates or the 60-meter hurdles at the national championships, he gets mad if he doesn’t win.

‘I don’t like to be outdone,” Mallett said. ‘If I put myself out and do something, I want to be the best at it.”

Iowa head track coach Joey Woody has been jazzed with Mallett since the day they met. It wasn’t just Mallett’s speed or the titles he had racked up, but the willingness to do anything he possibly could to get better.

Woody raves about how Mallett was one of the only track prospects he’s come across who was as obsessed with watching film as he was.

It’s something a lot of coaches have their teams do in a group session to get better, but watching film on one’s own was a marker, in Woody’s eyes, of an athlete whose devotion wouldn’t have to be tested. Part of the drive also comes from his mother, Vernetta Nash, who said she instilled the strong work ethic from an early age.