From saving goals to chasing them

She learned early to trust her hands.

In soccer, that meant standing alone in the goal, reading angles, reacting in a split second. As a goalkeeper, everything came down to instinct — reach, grab, stop.

In softball, it was different, but not entirely. The ball moved faster, the throws mattered more, but the same fundamentals applied: control, timing, accuracy.

Now, years later, those same instincts show up in a different place.

That works for Julie Lowe-Sanchez. She’s used to change.

“My father worked for Lockheed, and we lived in California, but they were starting to lay people off, so he traveled around the country as a rep to try to avoid getting laid off,” Lowe-Sanchez said. “We've been all over the country. I mostly grew up in California as a kid, but I spent my middle school and high school years in Albuquerque. I moved back to California because I missed it and then moved back here because I missed it. I've been here in Las Cruces for about 30 years now, plus the 10 years when I was younger.”

On a throwing field at the Senior Olympics, she grips a javelin, steps into her motion and lets it fly. It’s a different sport but built on the same foundation.

Lowe-Sanchez didn’t grow up throwing javelins or stepping into a shot-put circle. Those came later, after a lifetime of team sports, after the rhythms of soccer fields and softball diamonds had long been established.

“I was always athletic,” she said. “I'm the youngest in my family, but the most athletic. I take after my father. I played indoor soccer, and I was the only female goalkeeper, and we were the winningest team in the co-ed league.”

The transition didn’t come from a grand plan. It started with a decision to try something new, one shaped in part by the lingering effects of a lifetime in athletics.

“I was a semi-pro downhill mountain bike racer for a few years,” Lowe-Sanchez said. “Well, by the time I retired, I was semi-pro. I wanted to do the Senior Olympics for a long time, but my work kind of prevented me from doing that. I couldn't get time off.”

Lowe-Sanchez worked for the post office, another activity that put demands on her body.

“It’s an extremely physical job, especially being out in the weather every day,” she said. “It just took its toll on my body, so I was doing nothing for like 10 years until I retired a couple of years ago and got into the Senior Olympics. I had been kind of good at discus when I was in junior high, so I decided to try discus.”

She wanted a sport that wouldn’t aggravate her back and neck issues — something more controlled.

“I wanted to do a more stationary sport,” Lowe-Sanchez said. “I could spin with discus or not spin, so I started off with discus. I thought I'll do javelin and shot put too. My first year, I actually didn't do the shot put because I didn't think I'd be very good at it. It ended up I was better at javelin and shot put than discus.”

The mechanics of shot put were unfamiliar at first, but not entirely foreign. There was still a connection between body and release, between preparation and follow-through.

Javelin was different.

“I didn't know much about throwing technique, but I've watched a lot of videos on YouTube and learned some of the things I'm doing wrong,” she said. “I would get an elbow injury throwing javelin. It’s a lot different than throwing a softball, the whole motion of your arm and the placement of it. I was getting injuries, so I was watching these videos and learning how to do that better.”

And suddenly, the pieces started to fit.

Where she once reacted to the ball, she now creates the motion. Where she once defended space, she now attacks it. But at the core, it’s still about feel.

There’s a different kind of competition in the Senior Olympics. It’s less about the noise and more about the moment, about showing up, testing yourself and seeing what you can still do.

For Lowe-Sanchez, that competitive edge never really left. It just found a new outlet.

There’s also something familiar in the repetition — the practice, the refinement, the small adjustments that lead to better results.

A goalkeeper studies angles. A softball player learns the right release. Now, it’s about foot placement, timing and the feel of the throw.

The details are different, but the mindset remains the same. Instead of competing with teammates toward a collective goal, she now competes against herself.

“If I come in third or fourth, I’m happy if I did my best,” she said.

On competition day, standing with a javelin in hand or stepping into the shot-put circle, she’s not thinking about what sport she used to play.

She’s thinking about the throw. The release. The distance.

The setting may have changed. She may be out there on her own now.

But the desire to compete remains.