Steiner grew up in the
Columbus suburb of
Dublin, Ohio, concentrating mainly on
soccer, only starting to run track in the eighth grade. She starred in both sports at
Dublin Coffman High School. Though sidelined for most of a year by a
torn ACL, she was an all-state soccer player while setting four state high school records and winning 14 individual and 2 relay state championships in track. Steiner was a dual-sport scholarship athlete at the
University of Kentucky (UK), starting her college career in 2018 as both a soccer player and track athlete. After a freshman soccer season in 2018 in which she started all 19 games for UK, scoring two goals and recording five assists, Steiner left soccer to concentrate on track full-time. In a 2022 interview for the
Lexington Herald-Leader, the daily newspaper of UK's home city of
Lexington, Steiner cited this decision as a key to her track development: ==Statistics==