Flagstaff, Ariz. â€" On Friday, HOKA ONE ONE and Northern Arizona Elite announced the signing of former Lion Danielle Shanahan. She will join a team of ten other elite distance runners specializing in distances from the 5,000 meters to the marathon.

Shanahan finished her LMU running career in the fall at the 2017 NCAA Cross Country Championships. She was 43rd place, three spots short of being an All-American. Shanahan continued to train with the Lion Head Coach Scott Guerrero in the spring of 2018 while finishing her Master's degree in Educational Studies. In the 2018 track season, she ran career bests at 10,000 meters (32:55.04), 5,000 meters (15:37.27) and 1500 meters (4:16.36).

"It's been a great run," Guerrero said. "Danielle started off with a bang as both the WCC and the LMU Freshman of the Year and she capped off her final season with career bests at every distance while qualifying in two events for the USATF Outdoor Championships. She's been a tremendous asset to our program and we'll surely miss her. But I'm excited for her as she starts this new chapter in her career."

Shanahan is one of the most decorated runners at LMU earning All-American honors last year in the 5,000 meters as well as a multitude of other accolades in her career.

"LMU has provided me with an environment where I had the opportunity to grow as a person and as a runner, and I would not be where I am today without Coach Guerrero's guidance over the past 5 years," Shanahan said.

When making her decision where she wanted to go after LMU, Shanahan said, "I've known I wanted to pursue a professional running career since early in college, and after I took my visit NAZ elite felt like a great fit to help me achieve the big goals I have set for myself."

Shanahan will join the team this summer in Flagstaff, AZ to begin training with HOKA Northern Arizona Elite. Her new teammates are amongst the elite in the nation. They are runners she can train and race with to help further her talents at the next level.

In the last week, Kellyn Taylor won the Grandma's Marathon setting a course record and running a career best by over four minutes. Stephanie Bruce was 3rd (32:05:05) in the USATF Outdoor Championship 10,000 meters while husband Ben Bruce was 14th (29:48.16) in the men's race. Other team members include Aaron Braun, Scott Fauble, Matt Llano, Craig Lutz, Scott Smith, Aliphine Tuliamuk and Futsum Zienasellassie.

Northern Arizona Elite President and Coach, Ben Rosario, has produced some of the nation's top distance runners with multiple World Championship and US Olympic Trial qualifiers and top-10 USATF Championship/elite Marathon performances.

"We are thrilled to have Danielle joining our team," Rosario said. "She is talented, she is a positive person and she is hungry to see just how good she can be."

Although her immediate plans and goals for the future are still in the works, Shanahan said, "Right now I'm just super excited to start training in Flagstaff with the team but I want to compete at the highest level the sport has to offer."

Shanahan will make her HOKA ONE ONE and Northern Arizona Elite debut this weekend at the 2018 USATF Outdoor Championships in the 5,000 meters. She will run on Sunday at 3:22 p.m. CST. You can tune into NBC Sports Gold to watch her run.