2014 Convention Update: Endurance Symposiums

NEW ORLEANS – The 2014 USTFCCCA Convention from December 15-18 at the JW Marriott Phoenix Desert Ridge Resort & Spa in Phoenix, Arizona, will serve as an opportunity for distance coaches to attend Symposium presentations from some of the nation’s premier coaches.

As with the other Symposium disciplines—jumps, sprints/hurdles/relays, and throws—eight prominent distance coaches will give hour-long presentations on specific aspects of their areas of expertise, available to all attendees registered for the convention.

Leading these technical sessions at the convention will be:

Scott Christensen is the lead instructor for and co-author of the curriculum of the Endurance Specialist Course of the USTFCCCA Track & Field Academy. Since 1981, he’s been the boys cross country and track coach at Stillwater High School in Minnesota. Four of Christensen’s Stillwater charges have gone on to break four minutes in the mile, while five have won state titles in the 1600. The cross country team has won the Minnesota state meet eleven times. Christensen led Team USA at the world junior cross country championships in 2003 in Lausanne and the senior team at the 2008 edition in Edinburgh.

In just five years at UConn, Andrea Grove-McDonough took a women’s cross country team that had never been nationally ranked in school history to an eighth place finish at NCAAs. Now the head women’s XC coach at Iowa State, she’s led the Cyclones to two Big 12 and Midwest Regional Titles in two years there. As professional athlete in the early 2000s, Grove-McDonough won two Canadian national titles and made seven national teams.

John Gondak is the director of track & field and cross country at Penn State after eight years running the cross country and distance squads as an assistant there. A year ago, Cas Loxsom and Brannon Kidder went 2-3 in the 800 at NCAAs—the first time in 68 years that a school had two of the top three in the event. Gondak coached Loxsom to the American college record in the 600 and six All-American awards. Three PSU men have broken 4:00 in the mile under Gondak, and his women’s cross country teams have made nationals five years in a row.

Joe Franklin’s New Mexico men and women have won five straight Mountain West cross country titles. Franklin also is the head coach for the Lobos on the track, where they’ve won three conference titles in the last five years. Before coming to Albuquerque in 2007, he ran the Butler programs for 13 years. After the Bulldog men finished fourth at cross country nationals in 2004, Franklin was named the National Coach of the Year.

Now retired, USTFCCCA Hall of Famer Chick Hislop spent four decades building a reputation as one of America’s best steeplechase coaches. Hislop led the Weber State program for 38 years. Highlights of his tenure there include a cross country National Coach of the Year award in 1991 (when the Wildcats finished fourth at NCAAs), and Farley Gerber winning a steeple national title in 1984. Gerber set an American record in the process, and is among 26 Wildcats who earned 46 All-American honors under Hislop. At the 1996 Olympics, Hislop was the assistant distance coach.

Dr. Iñigo San Millán is the director of the Human Performance Laboratory at the Anschutz Health and Wellness Center and a faculty member of family medicine and sports medicine at the University of Colorado. Dr. San Millán is considered one of the top and most experienced applied physiologists in the world, and has worked with many elite and world class athletes and teams in sports including track and field, running, cycling, triathlon, rowing and basketball, including six pro tour cycling teams, a Tour de France winner and 16 Grand Tours podium finishers. He’s a former professional cyclist and earned his PhD from the University of the Basque Country in Spain.

Paul Spangler is in his fourth season as the cross country coach and assistant distance coach at Florida. He led Cory McGee to second-place finishes at outdoor nationals in the 1500 each of the last two years; in 2013, McGee finished third at USAs and then ran 4:06 to qualify for the world championships in Moscow that summer. Ryan Schnulle took second in the 800 at NCAAs under Spangler’s guidance in 2014. Before Florida, Spangler was an assistant at VMI and Florida State.

WHERE DO I REGISTER?

Are you a USTFCCCA Member?	Are you a high school coach?
Current USTFCCCA members are eligible to register themselves and their spouses for the 2014 USTFCCCA Convention in Phoenix, Arizona	Are you a high school coach from a member association in Colorado, Illinois, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Ohio, Wisconsin or the host state of Arizona?

The option to register a spouse for the USTFCCCA Convention is available during the member registration process, or available after-the-fact here.

Contact Dave Svoboda at [email protected] or 504-599-8901 if you have questions about the login process.