2014 Convention Update: Sprints/Hurdles/Relays 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 sprints/hurdles/relays coaches to attend Symposium presentations from some of the nation’s premier coaches.

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

Dan Pfaff may be the world’s foremost expert in the biomechanics of track & field. Now the director of the World Athletics Center’s Education program, Pfaff has coached 49 Olympians and 51 world championship qualifers, with his athletes earning nine medals at both. The most recent Olympic gold medal by a Pfaff-tutored athlete is Greg Rutherford’s in the long jump for the United Kingdom in 2012. In the NCAA, Pfaff coached at UTEP, Texas, and LSU, garnering 29 individual national championships and 17 team titles. In addition to his technical expertise, Pfaff is regarded by many as the finest teacher of coaches in the track & field world.

Kebba Tolbert took two Harvard women to NCAAs and two more broke league and school records. That was Tolbert’s third year coaching women’s sprinters, hurdlers, and jumpers in Cambridge; in those three years, the team has won two indoor and two outdoor Ivy titles. In 2012-13, two Crimson athletes were named All-American. Before Harvard, Tolbert coached at Iowa Wesleyan, McKendree, Syracuse, Portland State, and UTEP, leading dozens of athletes to All-American status and winning multiple national championships.

In Curtis Taylor’s first year as the women’s sprints, hurdles, and relays coach at Oregon, the Ducks won their fifth straight indoor NCAA meet. Before coming to Oregon, Taylor led the women’s program at Laney College, where his teams won the California state meet in 2010 and 2012. Last year, Phyllis Francis set college and national indoor records in the 400, and she was part of a 4×400 relay that broke the collegiate indoor record.

Caryl Smith Gilbert just finished her first season as the director of track & field at Southern California. Under her leadership, the USC men took fourth at indoor nationals in March. Before moving to Los Angeles, Smith Gilbert ran the women’s program at Central Florida, where her team finished fifth at indoor and outdoor NCAAs in 2013. She also coached DeeDee Trotter to bronze in the 400 at the 2012 Olympics. Smith Gilbert was an All-American and Pac-12 champion sprinter for UCLA.

Lawrence Johnson coaches two of the best hurdlers in the world: Brianna Rollins and Queen Harrison, both past Bowerman Award winners. In 2013, Rollins set the American record (12.26) and won the world championship in the 100 meter hurdles. Harrison took fifth in the world in the same race. Johnson was the director of track & field at Clemson from 2008 to 2012, and has made stops as an assistant at Virginia Tech, Southern Illinois, and Arkansas.

Andy Eggerth’s Keenesaw State teams have dominated the Atlantic Sun since Eggerth took over five years ago as director of track & field and cross country. The Owls have won the last three indoor conference meets and three of the last four outdoor conference titles. Their women’s 4×100 relay qualified for NCAAs. Before Keenesaw State, Eggerth was an assistant at Kansas State and UAB.

In his two years as the sprints/hurdles coach at Harvard, Marc Mangiacotti contributed to the Crimson’s highest point total at Heps in 21 years. Before Harvard, Mangiacotti assisted at Brown, where he had athletes win nine conference titles. And at Wheaton (Mass.), eight of his athletes won Division III national titles.

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.